


City of Sunshine

by viridianjester



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Dollars (Durarara!!), Eventual Canon Divergence, Gen, Illegal Activities, Kidnapping, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Self-Insert, Swearing, Time Travel, content warnings before chapters when applicable, nothing worse than in canon but like
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-29
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:33:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 35,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24982393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viridianjester/pseuds/viridianjester
Summary: The problem that a seemingly normal waitress at Russia Sushi had was no ordinary problem, and it could not be solved by ordinary means. Even worse, she didn’t even know if her problem ever could be resolved.After all, 'how to get home after being spontaneously transported into an anime you haven't seen since high school' wasn't exactly something she could Google, now was it?
Comments: 40
Kudos: 165





	1. Faking Normalcy

Fake normalcy is something one can encounter anywhere.

It could be in the little things - friends faking complacency after one found out the other was lying to them about something trivial - or in larger scenarios - passerbys putting up a front after a life-shattering event, be it a death in the family or something else. Anyone could be hiding something behind a false smile and platitudes, and the majority of people would never catch on (or if they did, they wouldn’t care to comment on it). 

While a false sense of normalcy is usually generated to hide mundane problems, sometimes, ever so rarely, those problems are extraordinary in nature. This is the case for one such person.

Her smile was fake, her voice was no longer quite her own, and her emotions were imitations - her true turmoil stuffed away in a dark corner in her mind. The problem that a seemingly normal waitress at Russia Sushi had was no ordinary problem, and it could not be solved by ordinary means. Hell, she didn’t even know if her problem ever _could_ be resolved.

So she just had one choice left - to fake normalcy. To fake it until the false smiles and platitudes she gave the customers consumed her. To fake it until… until she could find her way home.

* * *

Usually, her life was quite boring.

Day in and day out, she went through the motions of the same routine: classes, work, sleep, and repeat. The monotony consumed her, eating away at her will and desires until they were only fractions of what they once were. And every damn day she felt so, so tired.

She didn't know how to break free from it. She made flimsy attempts to fix it before - exercise, socializing, ect. - and at this point, she firmly believed it was a lack of a goal, a _purpose_ in life, that left her wanting. 

It was frustrating, really, since she knew no matter what she put her mind to, she would never be good enough. Scowling, the woman flicked through various apps on her phone. She'd never figure out what she wanted to do at this rate, and that hollow feeling rooted deep in her very being told her that she was approaching burnout - and a large one at that.

Abruptly, the bus she was on ground to a halt, and she heard the doors creak open. Not even bothering to look up from her device, as she'd glanced outside at the last stop and confirmed it was the one just before her own destination, the woman rose from her seat, slung her backpack over her shoulder, and made her way over to the exit before jumping off. 

Suddenly, the woman was overcome with a bout of nausea and squeezed her green eyes shut, leaning against a brick wall to steady herself-

Wait, a wall? There wasn't a wall at this stop - it should be a small roadside garden.

The woman, unnerved yet still feeling sick to her stomach for seemingly no reason (must have been a bad meal at the campus' dining hall), calmed her shaky breathing before carefully wrenching her eyes open. Colors flooded her vision and-

She sure as hell wasn't at her university anymore. And what was with the… background effects? It almost looked like-

The woman steadied herself against the wall before taking an inventory of her surroundings. It was best to have as much information as possible before jumping to conclusions.

She was in an alleyway, that much she knew for sure. She was stuck between two sturdy walls, the sky above her a clear blue. Eyes flicking behind her, she saw a fragment of a bustling street, people walking by either with friends or on their phones, not paying any attention to her. Looking to the skyline, she saw skyscrapers reaching upwards, lined with glass. This was normal for a large city, and it almost reminded her a bit of Chicago, even if the Sears Tower (or the Hancock Building, whatever) was nowhere in sight. 

It was perfectly normal, but her university was not in a city this big. Nor could a bus fit in this tight alleyway. Surprisingly, these large inconsistencies didn't quite cause her to panic. It was strange, sure, but the smaller details worried her much more.

Specifically, the fact that everything looked straight out of an anime.

The colors of her surroundings blended together too smoothly to be natural, and the people had definite outlines to them. Her first thought was that someone messed with her glasses, but even if the background quality was significantly worse without them, looking down at her own hands also revealed that accursed outline. 

...Maybe this was a dream? No, she shot that thought down quickly - even with her killer headache, she was still more lucid than normal for one of those. Best to treat it as real just in case, and with any luck, she just fell asleep on the bus (even if that meant she'd miss her next class, but anything was better than being stuck in a random-ass anime city). 

Speaking of her headache, she was fairly certain a large part of it was from adjusting to… whatever the hell this was. Straining her ears to eavesdrop on some of the fragments of conversation from outside the alleyway, she confirmed that whatever language the people were speaking wasn't English. 

That didn't mean she couldn't understand them, but it sure did hurt.

It was like… an overlay, almost. She could hear what they were saying in their own language (presumably Japanese, from what little words she knew of it), but she could also 'hear' an English translation of what they were saying above that. And by 'hear,' she meant that the meaning was seared into her brain, interrupting whatever train of thought she happened to have.

It both hurt her brain and was fucking weird.

She took some deep breaths but still focused on their conversations. Each time she heard a word, statement, or fragment of one, her head hurt a little less. She counted internally as she let the words wash over her, adjusting to this new language. Eventually, it stopped hurting entirely, even if she didn't know how much time she'd lost leaning on that alley wall.

 _"Alright, it's time for some sort of plan,"_ the woman murmured to herself. She stood up tall, her legs no longer feeling like jello. "Now-"

She stopped, blinking. That later word seemed to be… not English. She tested both languages on her tongue, flipping between them. She didn't know _what_ the second language was, but if her hunch was right…

Well, it'd certainly make her time here a little bit easier. Hopefully, that time would be short.

That led into her plan. Step 1: find out where she was. Step 2: find a way to contact her parents. Step 3: go home. Simple, right?

If only. 

Brushing her right hand through her hair, she let out a short sigh before schooling her face into an amiable mask. It was time to ask where she was. 

Walking out of the alleyway with faux confidence, her eyes scanned over the crowd - there, a high-schooler. She didn't remember that uniform from earlier passerbys, so somewhere in her headache/language adjustment process, school must have let out. At least this way, she wouldn't be bothering any businessmen or women.

"Hello! You wouldn't happen to know where we are, would you? I'm afraid I took a wrong turn and got a little lost," the woman said, the words rolling off her tongue in that second language. The light blue uniform looked vaguely familiar, but she figured it wasn't too important at the moment. The girl looked up from her flip phone, slightly startled before letting out a sigh of relief.

"Oh, Sunshine City is a block that way," she stated, gesturing to her left. "It's a pretty big landmark in Ikebukuro, so you should be able to find your way from there." The woman's smile tightened just a tad; the girl had already turned her attention back to her phone.

"Thank you, have a good day," the woman clipped before walking off in said direction, thoughts racing.

She was in Ikebukuro - a part of Tokyo, Japan. Right, she could deal with that. Not great, by any means, but at least she knew where she was now. What she might not be able to work with, though, was…

Glancing around to confirm her thoughts, the woman groaned internally. 

Nearly every single person on the street had a flip phone, and only a small minority had extremely outdated iPhones. 

She had a sinking feeling she wasn't in the same _year_ anymore either.

Slinking into an alleyway and making sure no one was following her, she pulled out her own phone - a relatively new Samsung Galaxy model. Turning on roaming, she sighed when she couldn't get a connection going. Shoving her rising panic into a neat little box at the back of her mind, she cursed under her breath before shutting her phone off. She then shoved it deep into her backpack.

It looked like she had to figure out _when_ she was too, and her only solace was that, due to the presence of phones at all, it was at least in the recent past.

Right, right… a time-traveling university bus was _totally_ normal. No problems here, none at all! Once again, she stifled her rising panic - now was _not the time_ for this shit.

So, new plan: find a library, hope they have public computers, and figure out when she was and if she could somehow contact anyone she knew for help. This was totally fine, definitely.

...She _really_ wished her life was still boring.

* * *

Good news: she was able to ask someone where the closest library was, and she found her way there easily. What was even better was that she didn't even need a library card or anything to use a computer.

Bad news: she was in twenty-fucking-ten. Essentially a decade in the past, in a foreign country where her IDs and cards were entirely useless. Her driver's license had been issued after that year, and her birthdate on it was listed way too early for her current age to match (there's a large difference between what should be a middle schooler and an adult). Her university ID was useless for a similar reason - the year printed on it hadn't happened yet. And her credit and debit cards? They hadn't been issued yet, and if she tried to use them, they either wouldn't work at best or she'd be arrested for fraud at worst. What would she say to the officer then? She didn't think 'sorry, I accidentally time-traveled and landed in another country on the way to class, and I just need to buy a ticket home, sir' was going to cut it.

She'd probably end up the laughing stock of a foreign police department when they inevitably wouldn't believe her. And if by some chance they did… she could end up as a lab experiment (especially considering - wait, nope, she was still in denial). Either way, definitely not ideal.

Suppressing a sigh, the woman took a deep breath before turning her attention back to the blocky computer. She knew now that if she contacted her parents, they would think that she was some random crazy person and ignore her plight. But… she really didn't have any other ideas. They were on another continent, so she couldn't reasonably ask a stranger if she could borrow their phone to call them. She wouldn't want to force international rates on the poor person. No, her best course of action was to find their Facebook pages and send them a message. Preferably her mom's page, as she checked it more often than her dad did.

The woman stretched out her arms above her head before clicking open a new tab and wandering over to said website. The writing system hurt her brain too, but at least she could understand it in a similar way to the spoken language (the characters swirled together to form an English overlay, and despite the ridiculousness of the situation, the woman counted it as a blessing). She typed her mom's name into the search bar, momentarily shocked when nothing came up.

That… wasn't right.

She was lucky enough that her last name was pretty rare, so not many other people were listed, but her mom's profile sure as hell didn't come up. A feeling of dread curled in her stomach, and the woman quickly typed in her dad's name next just to be certain.

He didn't come up either.

Great, great - this was absolutely _wonderful_.

The woman's hands began to shake, and she took a few deep breaths to steady herself. Then, she went to Google and began typing things in, desperate to find any connection to her home.

Her town? Still existed. Her house? Still existed, but owned by different people. Her parents and brother? Didn't exist. Other family members? Didn't exist. Hell, in a fit of desperation she even tried to log into her old school account, but it, too, did not exist.

She was beginning to think she'd have to take the L on this one - she had no family, no money, no _identity_ , and no way home.

...Well, she could fix _one_ of those problems.

It was time for a new plan (and hopefully, her last one). First, she needed a job. Since she didn't have any credentials or an identity, it would be… difficult, to say the least. With any luck though, she could spin a decent sob story to any potential employers and get by with some sort of customer service job. If not… she still needed money, and she _really_ hoped she wouldn't have to do anything too unsavory to get some.

Having money would let her buy food and a place to stay, which was a necessity. Not having any identification would be… _problematic_ , to say the least, but she'd just have to try her best to not get arrested while looking and hope that someone would let her rent a place. However, she needed to work on that sob story. Of course, she'd only give it if asked - less complications that way. 

Playing the dumb foreigner card was out since she didn't have a passport on her. Her… abilities let her speak the language well enough (people seemed to get the impression that she was fluent, at the very least), so maybe she could simply claim that her parents were immigrants if asked. Other than that, she only had a few fleeting ideas.

Maybe she could simply say she was in a bad situation and didn't want to talk about it? It was true enough and would let people draw their own conclusions - she'd just have to be especially nice so that those conclusions didn't turn too sour.

Right, that was doable.

After she had a somewhat steady income and a place to live, she'd have to start looking for a way back. Maybe look for any weird things happening in the city? If she ended up in a customer service job, then she could easily listen in on gossip, and she could parse through articles and internet forums for more information at the library whenever she didn't have a shift scheduled (even if thinking as such was getting a little ahead of herself).

The woman nodded to herself. It seemed like a plausible plan, given the situation.

Absently, a few key details flickered to the front of her mind. That blue uniform, Ikebukuro-

Scowling, she pushed them back. Being in an anime, let alone one she knew, was… becoming more plausible, but it was still incredibly unrealistic on principle. Until proven otherwise, she'd go with the theory that this was an anime-esque alternate dimension where she was unlucky enough to not exist before her spontaneous arrival.

Moving her thoughts to a more productive topic, she needed a name. Her own wasn't Japanese, and it wouldn't fit in with her awkward fictional backstory. That, and it would attract unnecessary attention. She did a quick Google search for the most common Japanese names and picked out a surname and given name for herself.

Mei Suzuki (or Suzuki Mei, depending on naming conventions). Good enough.

Speaking of naming conventions… she'd have to be especially careful to say her new last name first. And to not accidentally drop suffixes. It was the little things that could ruin her story, after all.

Sighing, the woman turned off the computer, picked up her pretty much useless backpack, and made her way to the building's exit.

Right, time to find a job.

* * *

No matter what her parents said, finding a job was _not_ easy. Especially finding one that would take her without proper identification. Even before this nonsense, the only jobs she got were coincidental and strokes of random, _extremely_ good luck.

She walked about the city, stepping in any store that had posted a flyer outside saying that they needed employees. She was denied outright almost every time, and those that she wasn't… well, they rejected her as soon as they asked her for an ID to complete the hire. In all honesty, she was lucky that none of them called the police on her. 

The woman fidgeted with the hem of her shirt. Her appearance probably wasn't doing her any favors either. She supposed that it was a good thing that she hadn't been… _transported_ when wearing a graphic tee from an unreleased series (she wore a lot of those), but what she was wearing didn't exactly scream professional.

Currently, her shoulder-length, wavy blonde hair was somewhat of a mess, and she had no makeup on. Normally, they would be the biggest potential issues, but thankfully, the anime-ness of her and her surroundings made them less noticeable. She was wearing an elbow length black shirt, dark blue jeans, and black _Vans_ , which, while not terrible, weren't what she'd prefer to wear to an interview of any kind. Back home, she had a suit for those.

Alas, she wasn't at home and would have to deal.

Looking up, the woman noticed that the sun was starting to dip low in the sky. She'd try one more place and call it quits for the night. She still had to find a relatively safe place to stay, and she didn't have any cash on her. Or at least any Japanese cash. Or cash that had a date not from the future on it. Or… well, the point stands.

Out of the corner of her eyes, a bright banner caught her attention. The woman slowed to a stop, blinking at it.

A sushi shop - one looking for waiters or waitresses. 

The woman didn't know much about sushi, but she figured she might as well give it a shot. She walked over to the door, gently opening it and stepping inside. The soft ringing of a bell attached to it brought the attention of one of the employees.

"Welcome to Russia Sushi, sushi’s good! How may I help you?" a tall African American man asked. He sounded familiar to the woman, and the man looked familiar too, but she simply brushed it off and gave him her best smile.

“I’m Suzuki Mei, and I’m here for a walk-in interview,” the woman said, bowing (it seemed to garner her better attention than a handshake in her past interviews in this city). “It’s nice to meet you.” 

The man beamed. “Wonderful! My name is Simon. Come in, come in,” he said, gesturing for her to follow. 

She did, keeping a friendly expression on her face while making sure to get a good look at her surroundings. There was the main sushi bar near the center of the restaurant, booths along the walls, and secluded tables in individual rooms near the back. The man took her near the back of the shop into one of those empty rooms.

The interview itself was pretty standard, and after all the practice she had today, she thought she was doing a pretty good job. Another man came in and talked to her for a bit too (he introduced himself as Denis and had gray hair), switching out with Simon for a bit before leaving her alone in the room, presumably to talk with the other man about how she did. Eventually, Simon came back, smiling broadly as he entered.

“Wonderful, Suzuki-san! You got the job. When would you like to work and how would you like to get paid?” he asked. 

The woman - Mei, now - smiled back, a tad nervous. “If it’s not any trouble, I’d like to start as soon as possible. And I’ll work for however long you’ll take me,” she began, “but… I would really like to be paid in cash, if at all possible.” 

The man’s eyebrows briefly knit together in confusion before going back to his normal, amiable expression. Mei was glad she caught that - the quality of the world made it a little easier for her to pick up on people's expressions.

“Are you in trouble? If so, we could help. You seem like nice person, Suzuki-san,” he stated, and Mei shook her head. Internally, she was a bit shocked at his kindness, but didn't want to bother the near-stranger.

“It’s… nothing that can be helped, really. I completely understand if you’re not willing to hire me now,” she stated, voice betraying how tired she felt. 

Simon shook his head. “That’s not a problem, Suzuki-san. We have no issue with paying you in cash.” 

Well, _that_ was certainly a different reply than what she was expecting. 

She dropped into a low bow, grateful. Maybe luck was on her side after all.

"Thank you so, _so_ much, Simon," she exclaimed, almost forgetting to drop the honorific as he had told her to earlier. "I'll do my best not to disappoint you." 

The man let out a hearty laugh. "No, I'm glad you're here, Suzuki-san. We really do need another person at night - it gets very busy," he said. "If you want to start today, you can." 

The woman beamed. "I'd love that - and please, call me Mei," she replied.

"Wonderful! I'll show you the ropes then, Mei. Don't be scared to ask any questions."

* * *

The sun had set a few hours ago, and by now, the woman thought that she had a decent enough handle on the job. Thankfully, Simon had found a blank name tag and a spare white and blue uniform for her (though the uniform was a little on the big side), and Denis had supplied a notebook that she could use to take orders. It was a little awkward to write at first, having to stick to Katakana via that weird internal translation system, but she got used to it.

Unfortunately, each customer was different, so she had to be constantly engaged and couldn't quite get away with just going through the motions. But on second thought, that was probably a good thing. Otherwise, she might not have noticed-

"Hey, you guys got a table open?" someone called. 

The woman turned away from the window-side booth she just finished serving and looked towards the front of the restaurant. She froze minutely when her eyes reached them.

Four people were at the door, all of which looked familiar. The one that stood out to her most, though, was-

"Kyouhei! I haven't seen you in a while. How are you?" Simon exclaimed from the counter, grinning at the familiar man with the bandana.

Didn't she have a key chain of that guy? It was given to her by an old friend who she had fallen out of contact with. Which meant-

She couldn't deny it anymore. She _was_ in an anime - _Durarara!!_ , of all things.

...A show she hadn't seen since high school.

Fuckity fuck - her luck really was garbage all along.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do you ever think of an oddly specific type of fic that you want to read but can't find anywhere? And then you decide to write it yourself? This is that fic for me. I rewatched Durarara!! a while back and the fic took on a mind of its own. Uh… oops? I have way more of it up on fanfiction.net (same title and similar username), and I’m gradually cross-posting it here. I should be posting once a week until we’re all caught up. 
> 
> Also, the title of this fic is most definitely a reference to Silver Queen's Dreaming of Sunshine. It's pretty much the SI fic for Naruto, and I'd totally recommend checking it out if it sounds even remotely interesting. Thanks for reading, and have a great day!


	2. Establishing a Routine

Simon was still talking to the group (the other three were characters too, if she remembered right - Erika, Walker, and… someone). Mei was really glad no one had noticed her internal panic and quickly pulled her outside appearance together despite her racing thoughts. Belatedly, she realized Simon and Denis were in the show too and that Russia Sushi was often visited by the main cast. 

This whole… _situation_ meant that the girl in the blue uniform must've been from the same school that the teen trio went to, now that she was thinking about it as she walked up to the sushi bar. Mikida was one of them, right? Or was it Mikado? And there was a blond one too, if she remembered correctly. 

Shaking off her disbelief, she gave Denis the latest batch of orders with a slightly tense smile before walking off to collect the next set.

The woman was usually very good at pushing her panic down regardless of the cause, and now, even if she was in an anime (God, her luck was absolute _garbage_ -), was no different.

...At least she knew where she was? And on the bright side, the… health hazards of this world weren't that dangerous in comparison to some of the other anime she'd seen. If she could avoid the plot, she could live a perfectly normal, albeit slightly illegal, life until she found a way back home.

Admittedly, that'd be hard to do at her new job, but still.

The only immediate worries to a civilian like her were Shizuo's street fights and Izaya Orihara. The former could be avoided with common sense, but the latter...

With his interest in the supernatural, she'd be done for if he found out that she was a time traveler. Or dimensional traveler? Whatever - even if he didn't catch onto _that_ , if she acted even the tiniest bit suspicious and he decided to investigate her… well, her lack of any documentation would make a _great_ source for blackmail.

At that moment, the woman decided to avoid Izaya Orihara at all costs.

Nodding to herself, Mei exchanged another page in her notebook for a few completed dishes from Denis and began to distribute them to the customers. As she walked back to gather another batch of dishes, Simon stopped her. 

"There are many dishes here, I can take them. Could you go to the second back room and take the orders there?" he asked, not unkindly. She quickly realized that he must not want her to get hurt carrying all those platters. There were... a lot of them, and as someone with no prior waitressing experience-

"Of course. Thank you, Simon," she acquiesced.

"Wonderful!" he exclaimed. "They are nice people, really. It would do good for you to make friends." 

Mei blinked before nodding, filing away in the back of her head that Simon thought, correctly so, that she was new to the city. Maybe it was her need for cash that tipped him off? He probably assumed she was a runaway of some sort, but she couldn't fault him for that. At least he was well-intentioned.

As she walked over to the room, she realized that the quartet had disappeared at some point and the voices in the room where she was supposed to take her next orders were… suspiciously similar to theirs. 

Ah.

She'd be talking with main characters.

But weren't Simon and Denis important characters too? They were super nice, helping her when she had nowhere to go and all. They were just _nice people_. And from what little she remembered, the four in the room she was approaching were nice too, if a bit eccentric.

As she opened the door, her customer service smile plastered on her face, the woman resolved to try her best to treat them like people rather than characters. 

She was stuck here for a time, and even if she may take cues from the show for her own self-preservation, there was no need to dance around those who used to be a part of the main cast (or to their faces, at least - that would just end up being weird for both parties). First and foremost, they were people trying to live their lives, just like her. And if she ran into them, she'd treat them as such.

...She sincerely hoped that the fact that she hadn't seen the show in a while would help her in that respect. And besides, from what little she remembered, it wouldn't matter too much if she derailed the plot a bit by accident. It wasn't some shounen series with the world at stake, after all.

"Welcome to Russia Sushi! My name is Suzuki Mei. How may I help you?" she said pleasantly, looking over the group in front of her.

"Oh, are you new here?" a man with shoulder-length light brown hair asked. Before she could reply, someone else at the table spoke up.

"A foreigner? Did you fall out of the sky in a burst of light like an isekai protagonist?" the blond one asked, grinning widely. 

The woman blinked. Sadly enough, that wasn't too far from the truth, even if no one would believe her.

"She does look like an anime character, with that hair and eye color," the brown-haired girl mused. 

...Oh? Mei's lips twitched upward; she couldn't help but be amused at the irony of that statement.

"Hey, Erika - maybe the world will go all 2D when she takes our order!" the blond man responded energetically.

...Wait, the world was practically 2D for her already. Were they growing self-aware?

The man with the black bandana - the one Simon referred to as Kyouhei - sighed. "Sorry about them. They mean no harm by it, honest. I'm Kadota Kyouhei," he said.

"And I'm Togusa Saburo," the man who first spoke to her chimed in.

"Karisawa Erika," the sole girl added.

"And Yumasaki Walker, at your service!" the blond exclaimed. 

This was quite different from the usual customer interactions she'd had so far - Simon must've asked them to be nice to her earlier. Mei stifled a short laugh. 

"I should be the one saying that, since I work here and all. It's nice to meet you," she said. "And it's no trouble at all, Kadota-san."

"Ah, that's good," he replied. Before he could continue, Togusa spoke up.

"So, about our order?"

Mei smiled and began writing as the group listed off their desired dishes. She was thankful he spoke up, for otherwise she might've been dragged into _Twenty Questions_ with the group. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing, as they didn't seem like bad people, but she'd certainly have to be more careful in leading conversations along in the future.

* * *

After what seemed like an eternity, the shop finally stopped accepting new customers. Mei hummed to herself as she helped Simon and Denis clean up for the night. Her mind, tired after a long day of denial and customer service, was still somehow functional, albeit to a delayed degree, and she began to think about her next steps. 

She still had to find a place to stay for tonight, didn’t she? It’s not like she could rent a hotel room without any money. Oh, and she needed to know when her next shift was too.

“Ah… that is problem,” Simon mused from behind her, and Mei jumped. Oops, she said that out loud. “If you don’t have place to stay, we can give you wages daily until you get back on your feet. You can rent hotel room, then.” 

The woman smiled, relieved and once again astounded by his kindness. “Thank you so much, Simon. That would really help,” she said as she went to put the broom away. 

“It’s no trouble,” Simon replied. “And we would be happy to have you tomorrow. How does 4 P.M. to midnight sound? We need most help with night shift.” 

She nodded. “That would be great, thanks.”

“Actually,” Denis cut in, drying off another knife before putting it away, “as far as shifts go, nights and weekends would be ideal. Since we’re paying you under the table, there aren’t any restrictions for how much you’re allowed to work, so it’s really up to you. Right now you’re the only other employee we have, and we don’t really keep regular hours. We’ll tell you what time we can have you come in for sure the day before until we get a good schedule worked out, but if you ever want a day off, just tell us. We’ll try to have a spare uniform ready here too so you don’t have to worry about it too much until you get your own place. Oh, and here’s your pay.” He rifled through the register and took a wad of bills out, passing it over to her. Mei counted them quickly, just double checking that she got the confirmed hourly rate (she trusted them but wanted to be safe). 

She smiled at him, grateful to be relieved of a good chunk of her problems. “Thank you, Denis. That sounds good - I don’t have many other things going on right now, so I’ll probably be coming in a lot, if it’s alright with you and Simon.” 

The older man’s lips twitched upwards into a small smile. “That’s fine. An extra hand is always helpful, and you’re picking this up quickly.”

“Actually, it is late. Su- ah, Mei. You should probably be getting to hotel room soon,” Simon added. 

“Yeah, I can give you an address to a pretty cheap one. You shouldn’t need to give them an ID either, just tell them I sent you,” Denis added, nodding. The woman’s eyes teared up a little. They were just so darn nice! And after… after-

Well, she needed all the help she could get.

“Thank you, I really appreciate it,” she said, dropping into a low bow and blinking away the start of tears. She rarely cried - only once in recent memory - and she wouldn’t let this break her composure. 

“It’s not a problem. Just be safe on your way over - it is a bit far. It’s-” Denis rattled off the address and directions for how to get there, and Mei committed them to memory. After grabbing her backpack and thanking the duo once more, she left. Getting a hotel room was rather simple once she mentioned Denis, and after locking up and setting the alarm, Mei collapsed on the bed.

It was a long day, and though she was sincerely hoping that she’d wake up back at her own place, she’d need her rest regardless.

* * *

An alarm blared, a different one than her usual phone alarm, and the woman rolled over, searching for a minute before finally finding the off switch of the device. Blinking away some of her tiredness, the woman looked over the bleak room before realizing that no, yesterday was not a dream, and yes, she was still in the same hotel room that she checked into last night. She’d gotten there at around one and set her alarm for ten so… nine hours of sleep. 

The woman rolled out of bed, grimacing at her wrinkled clothes. She needed to buy new ones soon. Actually… the woman pulled out her pay from where she stuffed it last and did a quick inventory. Most of her pay was taken by the room (though it was a pretty good rate, all things considered), so she didn’t have enough for a new outfit. Maybe a new shirt, if she were being generous, but that was it. At least she’d be able to get in more hours today - eight as opposed to her yesterday’s five. 

Although… did they have thrift shops in Japan? That would help her look presentable, at least. Thankfully, the hotel had a few laundry machines, so she’d be able to wash her current clothes if she could get new ones. Hmm… she needed to buy food too, didn’t she? She could probably make it through one day on granola bars or something…

Sighing, the woman walked into the bathroom. First order of business was to take a shower and get somewhat presentable. The rest would come later.

* * *

It turns out there were thrift shops in Japan, and a lot of them. After taking a shower, brushing her hair awkwardly with her hands, and attempting to smooth out her clothes (they weren’t too bad, thankfully), she went back to the library from earlier and looked it up. She also looked up instances of dimensional travel and was unsurprised when nothing concrete came up - only rumors and speculations that wouldn’t help her now. The woman would simply have to devote more time to it later, preferably once she had a stable income and a permanent place to live. _Durarara!!_ wasn’t a show about intradimensional time travelling from what she remembered.

...Wait, what was it about? The woman could only remember something vague about gang fights and the headless rider. Sighing, she brushed off that train of thought. She had more important things to do.

Eventually, the woman left the library and found her way to a thrift shop. She was able to pick up a few jeans and a couple of new shirts in her size, along with a light beige coat, and all for a pretty good price. She also grabbed a granola bar and some water from a convenience store for breakfast. She also picked up a few smaller things here and there, throwing it all into her backpack, and made it back to the hotel in decent time. She got dressed and brushed her hair (with a real hairbrush this time, thank goodness), and nodded to herself. Everything cost a lot less than she thought it would, and she was extremely grateful.

The hotel said she could keep her stuff here and pay for each night when she got back from her shift in cash, which was really nice. She still had her old wallet too, and since she didn’t need her phone - since it didn’t really work - all she needed to bring to work with her was her wallet sans IDs (she could get in trouble for those as they were clearly American and dated wrong) and the room key. She pulled out her plain black lanyard and took her old keys off, putting them in her backpack, and put the room key on it instead before tying it through her belt loop. It would be bad if she lost it, after all. 

Thankfully, she made sure to get pants with big pockets and was able to fit her old _Fullmetal Alchemist_ themed wallet in with no problems. Walking about the room just to make sure the wallet and key wouldn’t fall out, she nodded to herself. Everything looked good, and it was time for another shift. She’d just have to grab something small on her way to tide her over and save up the rest of the money she would earn (making some allowances for food), and she’d be well on her way to getting a small apartment of her own. After that… well, she’d have to do some budgeting, but she’d hopefully be able to buy herself more than three pairs of clothes. 

Best of all, once that was all settled, she could start looking for a way home.

* * *

Day in and day out, Mei continued her job at Russia Sushi. It took longer than she expected to save up enough for an apartment, and it wasn’t like she was slouching either. She worked every day, greeting customers and taking their orders with a smile plastered on her face. Thankfully, Simon and Denis pointed her in the right direction for apartments, and she was able to find a cheap one that wasn’t too far from work. It may have been a bit run down and cramped, but she didn’t need roommates and she didn’t need to show ID to rent it, so it worked well enough. She did the math using some notebook paper and the calculator she had stowed away in her backpack, and it would cost exponentially less than the hotel did, even if she knew logically that she was getting a good deal on it already. 

Her routine was set. She had a job, and although she didn’t really have friends, she had to use her extra time to get familiar with the area anyways, so it didn’t really matter. She did, admittedly, have a few more… _interesting_ customers at work, but they were pleasant and easy to get along with. She met Heiwajima and Tanaka along with a red-haired man in a suit that looked vaguely familiar (maybe from _Durarara!!x2_?), and Kadota’s group came in a few more times as well. Hell, the only people who gave her any trouble were a group of high schoolers who kept cat-calling her, and Denis had promptly thrown them out. It was a lot better than her last customer service job, that’s for sure…

Oh, and the city was amazing. The woman was from the suburbs, and even though she’d been to big cities before, she had never lived in one. It was fascinating to her, the lively sounds of people bustling about, the towering buildings, the lights at night… she thought it was a nice change of pace, despite the situation. She’d even seen the headless rider speeding about a few times!

Speaking of people though, she’d unfortunately noticed she’d been garnering an abnormal amount of attention while walking the streets, mostly from kids. She wondered why. They kept looking at her face - a lot of people wore glasses, so what was the big deal? Eventually, while chatting with Kadota’s group as she brought out their food, she found out the reason.

“Hey, Suzuki-san, what hair dye do you use?” Yumasaki asked.

“Yeah, the color’s really nice,” Karisawa added, leaning forwards. 

“Oh, it’s natural,” the woman said. 

Togusa blinked. “That’s rare. Cool, but rare.”

“It probably attracts a lot of attention, doesn’t it?” Kadota asked, and the woman nodded, internally scolding herself. It was so obvious! Of course, it was a perfectly normal color to have where she was from, but she wasn’t in America anymore.

“It does. I’ve been thinking about dying it, actually,” Mei replied. 

Yumasaki frowned. “Aw, but it looks so good!”

“It’s understandable though,” Karisawa added. “Have you ever dyed your hair before? I can help you if you want.” 

Mei smiled, a bit embarrassed. “I did once in high school, but I don’t remember the process,” she stated. “Thanks, Karisawa-san. I’d love some help.” 

Karisawa beamed. “Oh, you can call me Erika. I’ll be dying your hair, after all.”

“Okay, Erika-san. You can call me Mei, then,” the woman replied, smiling.

“You can call me by my first name too,” Yumasaki - no, Walker - added. Togusa and Kadota, now Saburo and Kyouhei to the woman, expressed similar sentiments.

“Great! When do you want to meet up, Mei-chan? And what color do you want?” Erika asked, eyes sparkling. 

“I think a dark brown would look nice,” the woman said. Considering her hair was naturally getting darker already, it’d also be less in need of touch-ups than black would be, and brown was still a common shade there. “And I’m free weekday mornings and early afternoons.” 

The two agreed on a time and place, and Mei went to take the next set of orders, a skip in her step. It’d be nice to hang out with people outside of work again, not that she’d ever had many friends to begin with. Taking care of her hair issue would be a positive too, and the van squad were all good people. They offered to go to lunch with her afterwards too, and she accepted. It’d be… a good change of pace.

A few days later, Mei came into work with her new brown hair. Simon gave her a thumbs up, and since Erika and Walker had seen her anime-themed wallet, outings with the van squad became a weekly occurrence.

Her false normalcy had become a routine, and then it had become real. Although the fact that she was far from home with no discernible way back still ate away at her mind, especially late at night, she was able to push it aside. She was a part of Ikebukuro now, whether she liked it or not, and… she’d make her time here pleasant, for what it was. 

Yes - she’d make her time here count. And now that she had a place to call her own, she could finally devote the rest of her free time to finding a way back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a bit of a transitional one, setting up Mei's daily life in Ikebukuro while slowly introducing more canon characters into the mix. Things will start to pick up soon though. Thanks again for reading, and have a great day!


	3. Breaking Monotony

Mei groaned, leaning back in the chair for the library computer that she was currently occupying. Finding a way back was… incredibly more difficult than she’d hoped. Logically, she knew that the world of _Durarara!!_ was quite similar to her own with the exception of a few legends here and there being real, so she probably wouldn’t find much. After all, if she looked up dimensional travel back home, all she’d find were cheesy fanfics, conspiracy theories, and creepypastas, and here was no different. There were _some_ things that seemed remotely possible - whispers of Yagiri Pharmaceuticals, which from what she recalled had something to do with Celty’s (who was the headless rider) head - but that was it. Everything else was cult crap. And on principle, Mei refused to attempt summoning a demon, especially when _Baccano!_ was in the same universe. 

That did mean it was possible, but she didn’t want to risk dying if something went wrong. And wasn’t _that_ a change of pace from her pre-dimensional travel thought process - she never used to care too much about stuff like that. She always used to be apathetic to the thought of her own death.

...Huh, it seemed like Simon, Denis, and the van squad had grown on her more than she originally thought.

The thought of Simon and Denis reminded her of work, and the woman glanced at the time. Scowling, she swore under her breath. Great, she was running behind. She could still make it if she left now though, so she swiftly turned off her computer and grabbed the black purse she had bought a little while ago with Erika.

As she briskly walked to her destination, thoughts flickered about her mind.

Spring was in full swing now, as opposed to the dull grays of winter’s end which welcomed her here, and Erika had mentioned that school would be starting soon. She hadn’t seen Mik-whatever and his blond friend, but if they were starting at Raira (she’d caught the name in a conversation with Kyouhei and confirmed that they had blue uniforms), that meant the plot might start up. 

In all honesty, she didn’t know if that was a good or a bad thing.

It meant more chaos in the city, which was obviously bad, and Izaya’s renewed interest in the area, which again wasn’t ideal, but…

 _Yagiri Pharmaceuticals_.

She vaguely remembered that company being important in the first arc. And since what’s-her-name ended up as Izaya’s secretary, the company must’ve flopped or had a major overhaul afterwards. At the very least, she knew they did research on Celty’s head, so maybe they delved into other supernatural topics. If, once the plot started up, she could ask what’s-her-name about it before Izaya got his claws into her…

Maybe she’d find a solid lead on how to get home.

That’d be great - _amazing_ , even! From what she remembered, there was a Dollars meeting (she’d heard plenty about the Dollars during her time in the city) and what’s-her-name was there, for some reason? Mik-kid (her new official nickname for Mik-whatever) and Izaya too, maybe? It was all blurry. But she did think it was a pretty big crowd, so if she could figure out when it was happening and show up, maybe wearing something to obscure her identity…

Well, all of it would be moot if that teen and his friend weren’t going to Raira this year.

Besides, the easiest way to be keyed into the meeting would be to join the Dollars, and considering that they were central to the plot…

Not ideal.

Hell, she didn’t even have a working cell phone or computer of her own, so it was pointless, really. 

Sighing, Mei worked up a smile before opening the door to Russia Sushi. Simon waved her in, and she went in back to change into her uniform as was routine by now. She grabbed her notebook (which she didn’t strictly need anymore, but it was easier to communicate orders to Denis that way) and pulled her brown hair into a high ponytail before straightening her black-rimmed glasses and making her way to the front of the restaurant. 

“Ah, Mei! There are two in the second back room. Could you please take their orders?” Simon asked, and Mei nodded. He’d always direct her to the first customers and occasionally a few others he wanted her to pay special attention to. It was all routine, familiar and comfortable. 

What was _not_ routine for the woman was _Izaya fucking Orihara_ sitting in the back room with the red-haired man, grinning like the cat that caught the canary. Thankfully, he wasn’t looking at Mei, but rather-

“Akabayashi-san, I appreciate-”

“Not now, kid. We got company,” the red-haired man (Akabayashi, according to Orihara, though that did sound right) said. “Thanks, Suzuki-san. We’re ready to order.” 

Orihara turned to her, and his expression flipped instantly to a politely interested smile. It practically reeked of insincerity, and Mei’s first thoughts were-

Conventionally attractive but a sociopath. Definitely a sociopath.

His jacket looked cute though. Very poofy. 12/10 poof.

Oh god, her thoughts were mortifying. At least this was the beginning of her shift. If it wasn’t… well, she might’ve said them out loud, and that would’ve been bad. Thankfully, she’d learned a bit more self-control since last time. 

“Suzuki-san, was it? I haven’t seen you here before,” Orihara stated. “My name is Orihara Izaya. Are you new here?” 

Akabayashi chuckled. “She’s been here for over a month - you’d know that if you stopped by Ikebukuro more often.”

“Well, if it weren’t for a certain Shizu-chan, that wouldn’t exactly be an issue,” the black-haired man said, shrugging. “It’s unavoidable, really.”

“...Right, so back to our order,” Akabayashi continued, and Mei was grateful. Writing down the order, nodding along as needed, she left the room quickly, but not too quickly. She _really_ didn’t want to draw attention to herself, and if Akabayashi was conducting a business deal with Izaya (no, Orihara - she didn’t want to accidentally call him by the wrong name) like it sounded, then she really didn’t want to act out of the ordinary. Akabayashi was, though not a regular, close to one, so he’d know if she was acting too weird, which could bring up a host of other issues depending on if he worked for anyone important.

...Great, no pressure or anything. 

Reinforcing her pleasant demeanor, Mei dropped the order off at the counter and made her rounds to the other customers. It would be fine.

Hopefully.

* * *

Unfortunately, that wasn’t Mei’s last interaction with Orihara for the day. Oh no, she had to deliver his order. And take the bill.

Admittedly, the first was more important to her current situation.

After making the rounds and delivering the next set of orders, she had to take the food Denis had whipped up to the customers. Normally, she was fine, but then again, she normally didn’t have the one person she was avoiding as one of her customers. 

Sighing, she resolved that there was nothing she could do. Her acting skills, already decent, were even better after this month, so she’d be fine with any luck. Picking up the trays, she knocked on the door to Orihara’s and Akabayashi’s room, not wanting to interrupt a potential transaction like last time (although she didn’t know if something suspicious was going on with them, she figured it was better to be safe than sorry). 

“Come in,” Akabayashi called. 

Working up a smile, Mei gently pushed open the door. “Here you are, gentlemen,” she said, placing their orders in front of them. “Do you need anything else?” 

Akabayashi shook his head, but Orihara stared intently at her, his brown-borderline-red eyes burning into her face. She blinked but carefully kept her expression blank. After a minute, he chuckled.

“Nothing, waitress-san,” he began, “although… you kept glancing at me while delivering the dishes. Any particular reason for that?” 

Mei wasn’t able to keep the surprise entirely off her face, but she was able to dial it back quite a bit. Ah, shit; she should’ve been more careful! What could she say? She needed to say _something!_

Out of desperation, she said the first thing that came to mind.

“Your coat’s fluffy,” she blurted out before mentally kicking herself for the knee-jerk reaction. Wait… she could work with this! She let her face go red, honestly quite embarrassed, and Orihara said nothing for a beat before chuckling. Akabayashi merely hid a small smile.

Great, there went her oh-so-precious self-control. She just _had_ to comment on the coat, didn’t she? 

“Oh, it is,” Orihara insisted after collecting himself. “Why, want to pet me?” 

Mei was… pretty sure that was an innuendo. Or at least it sounded like one.

“No thanks, I’m good,” Mei drawled, leveling a warning glance at Orihara. The black-haired man put his hands up, leaning back. Akabayashi let out a short laugh. The sight of a waitress standing up to the feared informant was probably amusing to him.

Ah, feared informant-

She probably shouldn’t have done that. She _really_ shouldn’t have done that.

Well, nothing she could do about that now. Dropping her gaze, she gave the duo a slight bow.

“If that will be all, please excuse me,” she said, and Akabayashi waved her off.

“Yeah, you got other customers to attend to," he said, and Orihara looked amused (and an amused Orihara was probably not a good thing for her).

Mei closed the door after exiting the room and sighed in relief as she picked up the next set of orders. At least they didn’t think she was spying on them or something, only that she was a slightly strange waitress.

Thinking back on it as she delivered food to her other customers, she was probably making it out to be worse than it actually was. It was just two funny lines, that’s all - no more, no less. She knew Akabayashi to be nice and reasonable from previous encounters, and Orihara… Orihara had more interesting people to toy with anyways. Especially once Mik-kid moved into town (and she firmly believed canon would start either this school year or the next one due to Heiwajima’s age and Orihara’s presence in Ikebukuro).

Yeah, she’d be fine. She just had to lay low.

Mei went about her business, checking up on customers, taking more orders, and delivering more food. She only checked on Orihara and Akabayashi once, and she made sure to knock on the door first, something she was sure that Akabayashi, at least, appreciated. Thankfully, it was uneventful and lulled Mei into a sense of security. Once it came time for her to bring them the bill, the woman was fully convinced that she’d be fine even with her screw up.

She delivered the paper, and Akabayashi offered to pay for the other man, to which he agreed without a fuss. As they got up to leave though, Orihara turned to face her.

“You know… maybe I should stop by Ikebukuro more often, Akabayashi-san,” he said. 

The red-haired man paused in the doorway. “Oh, really?”

Orihara hummed. “Of course! The service here was quite good,” he said, smirking. 

Mei hid her emotions, stuffing them away for now. “I’m glad you think so, Orihara-san. Akabayashi-san, Orihara-san, have a good evening,” she said amiably with a placid smile.

“Oh, I will,” Orihara said, waving to her as he left. Once the pair was safely out the door, Mei leaned on the wall, taking in a deep breath.

...She’d called it too soon, didn’t she? 

Maybe he’d forget about her.

...Maybe?

* * *

Orihara did not, in fact, forget. He showed up the day after. And the day after that. And the day after _that_. It was making her uneasy, really, but no matter how much it gnawed away at her, she refused to give him the satisfaction of… whatever it was that he wanted.

She assumed he wanted to see her embarrassed or for her to sass him again (although why he would want the latter, she didn’t know), so she resolved to be the most boring, obnoxiously pleasant waitress she could. That didn’t stop him from attempting to get a rise out of her though, and he tried various approaches. All of which from the _very public_ sushi bar or booth seats.

Sly comments? She wouldn’t reply with no more than a fake smile and an ‘oh, really?,’ if at all. 

Spilling drinks or food on her? She’d say ‘oh, it’s fine’ and go get changed in the back before coming right out, smile plastered on as always.

Tripping her so she’d spill drinks or food on other people? She’d angle the fall so she got the worst of it, profusely apologize to the other customers if she failed to shield them, and go change her clothes in the back.

Admittedly, she _did_ get rather annoyed with his childish shenanigans, but she was stubborn. She wouldn’t give in, for it wasn’t an option to her. Although she _may_ have been scaring the other customers with her smile by the time he left. It did become rather... _intimidating_ after she got annoyed enough.

Midway through the second week of that nonsense (he'd only started spilling food and drinks in the last few days though; she'd gotten the impression that he was getting impatient for something, even if she wasn't sure what he was after), Orihara became even more brazen in his attempts to get on her nerves. As soon as she got him his drink for the day (tea, but only warm - she didn't trust him with hot beverages after he'd shown a propensity for spilling things), he tossed it onto her shirt. Openly. He just… yeeted it at her. Without provocation. The woman merely smiled, its falseness becoming a deadly weapon that would make lesser men cower, but Orihara was unperturbed. 

“Sorry, Suzuki-san. I slipped on this table here,” he said, a seemingly pleasant smile marring his face. “You should’ve wiped this table off better, don’t you think?” 

Her hands tensed, nails cutting into her notebook. That was a bold-faced lie if she ever saw one; she didn’t even wipe that table down yet, so it was perfectly dry and he knew it. He was no longer trying to hide his attempts at getting on her nerves with what could be accidents - this was a pointed attack on her person.

“Whatever you say, Orihara-san. I’ll get you another one,” she said, tone sickeningly sweet. 

“Ah, there is no need for that, Mei!” Simon said, walking over to her. “I’ll take his order and clean up here - you get changed.” 

A relieved look flashed across Mei’s face before she covered it up, and the twitch of Orihara’s lips alerted her that he caught it. _Dammit_ , she didn’t want him getting the satisfaction-

But she was scaring the customers again. And he _was_ a real nuisance.

...It was probably best that Simon took over.

“Thank you,” the brown-haired woman said, bowing slightly to Simon. “I appreciate it. I’ll go get cleaned up.” Calmly, she turned around and walked to the back room, shirt dripping with tea.

Once she closed the door and took out her new clothes, she allowed a scowl to surface. Orihara was lucky that her uniform and the T-shirt under it were baggy. If she wasn't as careful with what beverages she got him and that tea happened to be hot instead of warm… she could’ve gotten burned. 

If she had, the woman didn’t think she’d have been able to stop herself from lashing out at him, at least not verbally (she knew she’d lose terribly in a physical fight, and she didn’t make a habit of starting those anyways).

...Wait. That was probably what he was aiming for, the bastard. 

At that moment, she sympathized with Heiwajima’s desire to punch him, she really did. Orihara was just so damn _irritating_.

But it was fine. Because he didn’t win.

She needed the help of a third party, but… he didn’t get the rise out of her that she wanted. It was fine.

Sighing, she let the anger seep out of her frame. Thank God for Simon, honestly. He was really kind and understanding, and he helped out a ton. Unfortunately, her T-shirt got attacked too, so she wouldn’t have anything to wear under her new uniform other than her bra. 

Ah, whatever. At least she was washing her own uniforms now, so the stains wouldn’t be an inconvenience to Simon or Denis. Only to her. Which was probably what Orihara had planned.

Damn, if she had to talk to him again, she’d probably have to lecture him about what was and was not appropriate behavior around waiters and waitresses. And around people in general, not that she thought he’d listen. 

All the previous drinks he'd thrown at her had been water, not something that would stain. And he didn't throw them at her openly; rather, they were more like poorly-designed ‘accidents.’ It’d just been annoying, not a major inconvenience. But if the drink was hot, and if someone else got hurt because she was too prideful to talk to him about it…

She’d feel like it was her own fault and hate herself for it.

Ugh, she had to talk to him about this. And have an actual conversation with him, disregarding false pleasantries and pretenses.

...Was that what he wanted to begin with? Would she be losing?

She shook herself out of that train of thought as she dried herself off with a spare towel. That didn’t matter anymore - this was a safety concern. _You don’t throw drinks that could be hot at people, ever_. Even if you’re one of the most feared men in Ikebukuro. It was rude and just plain uncalled for. Mei would not tolerate it.

Sighing, she realized she could’ve handled this situation better to begin with. She should have drawn the line two days ago when her smile started scaring the customers.

Fuckity fuck, she sure did mess this one up.

After throwing on a clean uniform, Mei closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths before standing up and opening the door. 

It was fine; she could do this.

She walked over to her first non-Orihara customer and started making the rounds. Some asked her if she was alright, ‘that tea did look like it was still hot,’ but Mei reassured them that she was fine. She picked up a few excess orders, glancing at Orihara out of the corner of her eyes to make sure that he wasn’t up to anything… fishy. He looked more subdued than usual, but she didn’t know why. He’d glare at some people whenever they started to talk about Simon unprompted, so maybe he said something to him. She didn’t really know nor care at the moment. Even if Simon did say something, it was still her problem to some degree, and she had to confront him before he left.

She brought the next batch of orders up to Denis, and he pulled her aside.

“Mei, are you okay?” he asked. 

The woman gave him a tired smile. “I’m not hurt - my clothes were baggy enough to catch most of it before it hit my skin. I should’ve stopped his habit earlier anyways. At the very least, I was conscientious enough to not give him a scalding hot drink after he’s been shown to be prone to throwing them, so it only stained my shirts, really.”

Denis shook his head. “It’s not your fault,” he said. “You do know that, right? And if something like this happens again, don't be afraid to talk to us about it.” 

“Yeah, but I shouldn’t have encouraged it by doing nothing,” Mei said, focusing on straightening her back to prevent herself from fidgeting. “And really, it's not like I got burned or anything.”

“...It is what it is now,” he began. “Just don’t feel obligated to take Orihara’s orders anymore. Simon will do it if he shows up at all.” 

Mei ran a hand through her dark hair. “That’s probably for the best, although I think I should say something to him before he leaves.” 

“As long as it’s not anything too unsavory, that should be fine,” he said. “Just be careful around him.” 

Mei chuckled dryly. “Believe me, I’ve been trying.”

Denis waved her off, and she went back to work. More orders, more food, more requests - an endless cycle. It was getting late, and the restaurant was pretty much empty, but eventually, she saw Orihara stand up to leave, and she made her way over to him.

“Orihara-san,” she started, “I’m sorry for whatever I did to make you angry at me, but please don’t throw drinks at people. It’s a safety hazard.” 

He blinked at her, surprised. Mei was tempted to blink too - that came out far more blunt than what she originally intended. It must’ve been the late hour, her brain got… less eloquent then.

“No, I got carried away. I won’t do it again,” the black-haired man said neutrally. Damn, Simon must’ve really gone off at him or something - he wouldn’t even look her in the eyes.

“...That’s as close to an apology as I’ll be getting, won’t it?” Mei asked, her lips crawling into a wry smile against her will.

“Probably,” he stated. Simon glanced over at him from where he was cleaning up a few tables, and the black-haired man twitched. 

She sighed. “Well, no harm no foul, I guess. Just don’t do that again. To anyone. Ever.”

“I already said I wouldn’t, right?” Orihara said, shrugging.

“...Okay, fine. Let’s just pretend that never happened.”

“That's an excellent idea.”

Denis raised an eyebrow at the pair, who were now just blinking at each other awkwardly. Eventually, the ridiculousness of the situation came over her, and she started chuckling. Orihara did too, and soon they were both laughing hysterically, leaving Simon and Denis to wonder what the hell they were doing. Once the laughter started dying down, Simon spoke up.

“This is good, yes? No more fighting,” he said, nodding. 

Denis turned towards them, frowning. “Though in all seriousness, Orihara, don’t do it again. She could've gotten hurt, and we don’t take kindly to that.”

“I noticed,” Orihara muttered under his breath. Mei barely hid her surprise in time. She didn’t think she was supposed to hear that. Just what did they say to him earlier? “And on that note, I should get going. Bye, Suzuki-san. Simon, Denis.” He stuffed a few bills into Mei’s hands along with the bill for his meal before skipping out of the restaurant.

“Alright, that was weird. Even for him,” Denis said. Simon nodded in agreement.

“...Right. Ah, is it alright if I keep this shirt? My T-shirt got soaked earlier…” she trailed off, and Denis shrugged.

“Of course, Mei! It’s no problem,” Simon replied.

“Thanks, Simon.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't really have much to say for this chapter. Some more character introductions happened, which was cool (a shout out goes to Coolalexia for catching that foreshadowing, good job!). Next chapter is my favorite one that I've written so far, for various reasons, so hopefully that's something to look forward to. Thanks again for reading, and have a great day!


	4. A Series of Poor Life Choices

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: See AN for details.

It’d been a week, and she hadn’t seen hide nor hair of Orihara. She had seen Erika though, and according to her, their days of false pleasantries at the restaurant had become a popular rumor lately. Something about a stone-cold waitress standing up to the fearsome informant, showing that she would take no shit from anyone. To Mei, it was rather funny - the actual story was that she’d put up with anything with a smile.

When she started laughing at the rumor, she had no choice but to relay the tale to Erika. The other woman had listened patiently, chiming in at all the right moments. At the end, Erika nodded before making her thoughts known.

“Izaya-kun was an ass,” she said resolutely. “But at least he apologized. Sort of. If he bothers you again, tell me, and I'll help you out.”

"That shouldn't be necessary - I think Simon must've talked to him about it. At least it’s over now,” Mei replied, and that was the end of that. Hell, maybe she’d be able to go back to avoiding the informant like nothing happened. Or at least she hoped.

Thankfully, her days at the restaurant did go back to normal. After an uneventful weekend, Denis asked her to come in early that Monday since students were going to be coming into town for the upcoming school year, which would result in busier lunch hours for the next few days. Mei agreed without a fuss, though once it hit six, she was already getting pretty tired. She'd been there for what… ten hours? That was longer than her usual shifts.

Simon and Denis, because they paid a bit more attention to her after the Orihara incident, picked up on it right away. The woman was absolutely terrible at monitoring her own well-being, after all.

"Mei, it has been long shift for you. Do you want to get food or rest?" Simon asked. Mei was about to reply, but Denis cut in.

"It's been a long day, and we don't have many customers right now. Go home. You can always get more hours in tomorrow."

Mei blinked, fighting back a yawn. That was probably a good idea. "Thanks, you two. Tomorrow at eight again, then?" 

Denis nodded, and Mei went into the back room to change. She put the blue and white uniform into a plastic bag before throwing her beige coat over her black shirt. Double checking that her wallet and keys were still in her coat pockets, she debated transferring them to her jeans but decided against it. She pulled her hair tie out, letting her hair fall in waves to her shoulders, before stifling another yawn and leaving Russia Sushi through its back door.

As she walked around to the front of the restaurant, since it was a bit easier to find her way home from the main street (she didn't want to end her shifts by leaving through the front when it was still open though, that was a bit too awkward for her), Mei thought about her good luck. Even if she had to cut her hours a bit short today, she could get a good amount of sleep in. Maybe she could even swing by the library again? That'd be good. But after food of course - she _was_ rather hungry…

Unfortunately, her luck wouldn't last. As soon as she turned onto the main street, she ran into exactly the person she hoped to avoid by sheer chance (or it seemed that way - she knew chance alone was scarce when it came to Orihara). The worst part was that he looked right at her, beaming.

Fuckity fuck.

Not this shit again. She was way too tired to put up a decent act. 

...Ah, whatever. She'd just have to try her best not to give anything important away. Anything else could be dealt with later. With any luck, he'd leave her alone once it became apparent that she couldn't hold a polite conversation.

“Suzuki-san! How are you?” Orihara asked, practically skipping over to her. 

She sighed. How did he have this much energy? Though maybe it was just her - she always got pretty lethargic and difficult to socialize with after work. She could only make it through by repeatedly reminding herself that she had bills to pay. She did like her job, honestly; it just got… a bit much, at times.

“Well enough,” the woman replied. “Orihara-san, what, exactly, are you doing here? I’m trying to walk home, and I’m rather tired, if you haven’t noticed.” After she spoke, Mei winced internally. Already back to sassing him, huh? Well, whatever. It wasn't unexpected. If he was talking to her, she was already on his radar, so it wasn't like she was attracting undue attention at this point.

“Oh, that won’t do at all! There’s so much to do in this city at night. People to bother, places to see…” he mused, spinning around before taking her hand. Mei flinched at his touch, unable to hide it in her sleepy state. Orihara frowned, and she grimaced internally; dammit, she really had to get her guard back up.

“Yes, I see you’re doing a lot of the former,” the brown-haired woman muttered. “Though in all seriousness, why are you here? I doubt it’s a coincidence.” 

The black-haired man placed a hand over his heart in mock hurt. “Why, Suzuki-san! So cruel,” he exclaimed. “But if you must know, I love humans-”

“Great, you’re not a furry. Can I go home now?” Mei cut him off, face paling as soon as the words left her mouth. Shit, shit, _shit_ \- she _really_ hoped that didn’t piss him off too badly. 

Orihara blinked, caught completely off guard. He stared at her, face blank for a few seconds (and it really was an amusing sight, almost worth the blunder that her sleep-addled brain made) before he finally collected himself, at least mostly. 

“Wait, I’m not done,” Orihara said, reaching into his coat pocket. Mei twitched. Didn’t he keep a knife in his pocket?

“I fully accept the possibility of being stabbed for that line, but, like, I’m cold. If you want to keep talking, fine. Just... can we do it inside? I don’t have a fluffy coat like you do,” the woman rambled, “and I’d rather be warm and stabbed than cold and stabbed, to be completely honest.” 

Orihara's eyebrows knit together in confusion. “...You’re fine with getting stabbed?” he drawled in disbelief. 

Mei shrugged. “I’d prefer not to, but I have it coming after what I just said.”

Orihara nodded. “You really do, but I was just reaching for my phone,” he explained. “I just got a text.” 

She blinked. “Oh. This is awkward.”

“Yes, I’m glad you noticed.”

“I know, I should get a gold star for that,” Mei joked, lips twitching upwards into a small smile.

“No, that sort of behavior shouldn’t be rewarded. Though if you like my coat that much…” Orihara trailed off, grinning.

“No petting jokes,” the woman said firmly. She’d had enough of those, for he kept bringing that instance up over the days he tormented her.

“Aw, you’re ruining my fun.” 

"Well, you seem to be under the illusion that I care about that."

Orihara chuckled before looking down at his phone, eyes lighting up mischievously. "Hmm… you just have to get the last word in, don't you?"

Mei merely shrugged before berating herself internally. It was a habit that ended up biting her in the ass here, unfortunately. 

Orihara grinned, putting his phone away and turning to Mei. "If you don't have any plans tonight… would you like to come with me, Suzuki-san? There's this girl I'm planning to kidnap, and-"

"What the fuck, Orihara," the woman interrupted, words escaping her in her tired state. "Seriously, what the fuck. I've only known you for less than three weeks, most of which we weren't exactly on amicable terms, and you want me to be your accomplice in _kidnapping_?"

"Well, you'd be more of an accessory, really," the black-haired man quipped. "And why are you counting? Does that mean if you knew me for more than three weeks, you'd be fine with helping me kidnap someone?"

"...I'm not even going to dignify that with a response." 

Although… Mei's thoughts started racing. Didn't he kidnap someone at the beginning of the series? A girl with pigtails who was later saved by Celty? If she did tag along, she could get a better indicator of where she was in the half-assed timeline she put together.

...Wait, she was contemplating being Orihara's _accessory to kidnapping_. This was a terrible idea.

Normally, she'd never even _consider_ helping someone else _kidnap a person_ . However, she needed to know when she was (a small voice in the back of her mind whispered that _needed_ was a bit of an exaggeration and she could just wait to see that Mikida kid around town, but she hastily brushed it off). 

Knowledge was power, right? And knowing would help her. Besides, the girl that was kidnapped was… fine, in the end. She didn't die or anything, and she went back to school like normal, so even if Mei had to ignore her morals, maybe it was worth it? Maybe?

Oh God, her morals. If she was already brushing them off so readily, this could be bad. Very bad. _Durarara!!_ 's plot involved a decent amount of illegal activity, so she could easily get caught up in it trying to keep tabs on the timeline. What if she started working for the mob or something?

"Well, maybe I should kidnap you too, then!" he exclaimed, grinning. "If you won't come along willingly, that is."

"Again, Orihara, what the fuck. This isn't how you have a proper conversation."

He let out a short laugh. "No, it isn't. But you're partially responsible for that, and it's entertaining in its own right." 

The woman blinked. Orihara was… having fun. This didn't bode well for her - time for damage control.

"I'm just an ordinary waitress, and I don't know what you want with me. Someone to pick on for your own amusement is my best guess. Regardless, I'm tired. Let me sleep, dammit. Or eat," she rattled off.

"I hardly think you're ordinary with all those quippy lines. Though how about a compromise - I drag you along, and you can sleep through all the boring parts. I'll even buy you dinner. Deal?" Orihara asked. 

Mei groaned internally. This was a terrible idea, an absolutely _terrible_ idea, but she was already on his radar so-

"Fine. Whatever. You better let me go home, afterwards," she agreed flippantly. The free food better be worth it. Besides, the girl would be kidnapped with or without her involvement. After she got an indicator of the timeline, she'd learn to avoid him better. And book it in the opposite direction whenever she saw his damned fluffy coat.

"Wonderful!" the man exclaimed, face splitting into a wide grin. "Just follow me, Suzuki-chan."

Mei blinked at the change in honorifics but merely shrugged it off. Belatedly, she realized she forgot to add them when addressing him earlier, though there was nothing she could do about it now. Hopefully, her swearing caught his attention more than that detail. Still grinning, Orihara grabbed her hand and dragged her into the nearest building. Mei sighed. This was going to be a long night.

* * *

Waiting for someone to be kidnapped was a lot more boring than she thought it'd be. Hell, she could almost see why Orihara dragged her along for company. Almost.

...Wait, that sounded bad. Mei was really regretting her life choices right about now.

On the bright side, Orihara _did_ get her food. They were stationed in an upstairs restaurant, looking out towards one of the main streets from a small round table. It wasn’t a place she’d been before, as Mei had been trying to stick to cooking her own food due to budgeting reasons, but they had _really_ good sukiyaki. She might have to come back just for that. Orihara was pretty much done with his food at this point and was intently scanning the crowd with his binoculars. Mei thought it was a bit weird and that binoculars were primarily for stalking and bird watching, but she wasn’t going to say anything to him about it.

But back to the topic at hand - the worst part about waiting for someone to be kidnapped was the waiting. There was nothing to do but pick at her food and make idle talk with Orihara. Thankfully, her crippling fear of seeming weird to strangers had allowed her to stifle her more… _colorful_ thoughts regardless of her tired state, but as a result, it was really boring. Orihara at least had his phone to check up on once in a while. Mei didn’t. 

Letting out a small sigh, she put her glasses back on and scanned the street. She was pretty much done eating at this point too and was idly sipping at her water as she looked. From what she remembered, Mik-kid and blondie passed pigtails on the street right before pigtails got kidnapped, so if she could spot a blond kid-

Ah, there he was. Blond kid in a white hoodie with another kid who had spiky black hair and was wearing a green and white jumper. They just passed a girl with her light brown hair up in pigtails. There, she confirmed her place in the timeline.

Mei expected to be relieved, but all she felt was apprehension. Maybe it was because she was about to witness a kidnapping.

Stifling down her emotions, she glanced over to Orihara. His face broke into a smirky grin, and he seemed to be looking towards pigtails who had just approached a man in an off-white coat with smooth black hair and glasses.

“See something you like?” Mei asked idly, the words falling from her lips without much thought put behind them.

Orihara chuckled. “Maybe, do you see the girl with the pigtails? She’s our target.”

“Yours, maybe. And yes, I do.”

Orihara nodded, seemingly pleased. “In that case, we’d better wave down the waiter. We don’t want to miss all the action, now do we?”

* * *

As soon as Orihara paid the bill, they left the restaurant. He grabbed her hand and practically ran down the stairs, grinning widely. He didn’t even look back at her to try to gauge her reactions like he’d been doing ever since he ran into her on the street; he was too busy trying to catch up to the kidnappers before they took pigtails away. He turned down a narrow street, sticking to one side before yanking her into an alcove and abruptly stopping. Mei was only barely able to stop herself from slamming into him. 

She was too busy regulating her breathing (she hadn’t exercised in a while, so the run had taken quite a bit out of her, even if she didn’t want Orihara to know that), making sure to take even, steady breaths, that she didn’t notice Orihara’s smirk. By time she focused back on his face instead of the metal wall they were hiding behind, he was already looking out towards the street.

“Suzuki-chan, do you see that van out there?” he whispered, excitement edging into his voice. “Those are the kidnappers I hired - they should be grabbing the girl shortly. This is the good part.” 

Mei bit her lip. Looking out to the street from where she was standing, she couldn’t really see much but the fence on the opposite side of the street.

“I could kind of see it when we ran here, but I don’t really have a good angle now,” the woman admitted against her better judgement, careful to keep her voice even and quiet. She didn’t want to attract any undue attention from the kidnappers still in the van, after all. To this end, she had also placed the bag containing her work uniform on the ground now that they were going to be staying here a while. It was plastic, so it could make quite a bit of noise if she wasn’t careful. 

“That won’t do! Why don’t you come over here, Suzuki-chan. It’ll be a little tight, but there’s room for two. You could even pet my coat while you wait,” Orihara replied, voice peppered with amusement. At this point, Mei was _really_ trying to ignore the coat comments. 

He held out a hand to her, and after once again berating her life choices, she took it. Orihara positioned her in front of him in the alcove, and she crouched down so he could still see as well (she was, unfortunately, the shorter one between them). This way, they could both peer out from behind the wall. 

Mei let out a small hum. “Pink isn’t a very subtle color,” she commented softly, noting the chosen attire for one of the two kidnappers still in the vehicle.

Orihara chuckled. “No, no it isn’t.”

Straining her ears, Mei realized footsteps could be heard approaching them, so she didn’t bother to reply. Glancing up at Orihara, who was intently looking towards the street they came from with a wild grin on his face and dark amusement in his brown-red eyes, she noted that he’d probably heard them too. Mei bit the inside of her mouth, fighting to keep her body from trembling.

Pigtails and glasses from earlier walked up to the back of the van, and glasses popped open the trunk. Inside, pink was waiting (Mei realized her nicknames weren’t very original, but she didn’t know their names and didn’t want to ask; all it would do was make her more attached to this fiasco).

“Hey,” pink said with a smile.

“Hello,” pigtails replied a little awkwardly, giving pink a small bow. 

“Are we all clear?” pink asked. 

Glasses looked around before replying, almost seeming to do so for the show of it rather than actually scanning his surroundings for other people. “There’s no one around at all."

Mei couldn’t help but wince. She might've been right in her earlier assessment. Still, not noticing her or Orihara? Man, these guys were bad at their jobs.

“Okay then… sorry for tricking you!” pink exclaimed before lunging at pigtails. Pigtails ( _Rio_ , Mei berated herself, _she’s a real person with a_ name-) screamed as pink grabbed her and slammed a portable gas mask over her face. Glasses pushed her into the car, and Mei could hear the girl struggling and screaming from their hiding spot. Oh God, she was watching someone get _kidnapped_ -

It didn’t matter if she’d be fine in the end, a child was freaking out right now (and rightfully so!). Mei shouldn’t just be crouching in the corner watching like some sort of degenerate-

Mei shifted, tensing up and getting into a better position to run ahead. Orihara briefly glanced down at her-

Right, Orihara. She couldn’t interfere, he had this all set up. She _did_ agree to this, to _watch_ this, and… she didn’t know if he’d care if she interfered or not, which meant she couldn’t afford to on the off chance that she'd get on his bad side by doing so. She forced her body to relax. She couldn’t do anything. She… really couldn’t.

Hell, even if she did try to help (and she had to do so directly, she didn’t have time to run off and get help; the van would be gone before she got back), what could she do? She had weak noodle arms and next to no ability to actually win in a fist fight. And they had weapons, or at least she thought so? Didn’t glasses have a taser?

Even with all these justifications, Mei felt like shit as she heard the girl’s struggles die off as she slipped into unconsciousness. She refused to turn away though, forcing herself to acknowledge that this was her fault for not being better, for not being able to do something, _anything_ . And yes, even though she felt like shit watching it, a part of her brain did take note that it was unfair for her to feel this way when someone else was _literally getting kidnapped right in front of her and was having a way worse time than she was, what the actual fuck._

...She _really_ regretted tagging along with Orihara.

Ah, right - Orihara. She glanced up at the man in question.

He didn’t _seem_ to be watching her reactions, although she _was_ panicking internally for quite a while, so it was anyone’s guess whether he actually saw some of her facial expressions or not. Mei tried to collect herself the best she could, schooling her face into a determinedly neutral expression (she didn’t know what was an appropriate response to _literally watching someone being kidnapped_ , so neutral would have to do) as the van drove off, leaving a lone cigarette on the pavement. 

Suddenly, Orihara leaned on the metal wall, causing it to rattle, before running out onto the street, putting his hands in his pockets, and stepping on the cigarette, grinding it into the ground. With a smirk, he spoke out, seemingly to no one. “But there _is_ someone here. Two someones.” 

Mei followed him out into the street after snatching her bag off the ground, fighting down her unease after… well, watching the kidnapping. Now that the girl was out of sight, it was much easier for the woman to push aside her feelings on the matter, not that it made her feel any less like a genuinely shitty human being. 

His face splitting into another grin, Orihara pulled out his cell phone before glancing back at Mei.

“Oh, Suzuki-chan, I have someone exciting for you to meet!" Orihara chirped, doing a little spin on the street. “I’ll have to give them a call to make sure things are still in order, alright?” 

The woman nodded, not quite trusting her voice just yet. 

Orihara hummed. “Actually… follow me, we can make our way over to our destination in the meantime,” he said before calling someone, lifting his phone to his ear. He had a definite skip in his step at this point, and Mei had to jog a little to keep up. “Yo. I’m sure I don’t need to tell a talented courier like you how to do your job-”

Ah, he was talking to Celty. That… makes sense. Didn’t the girl ride around with her for a while after getting rescued?

Rescued! Right. With Celty on the case, the girl would be fine - it was… fine (it definitely wasn’t, but Mei now remembered _how_ , exactly, the girl was saved, and things _seemed_ to be on track so… good enough, really). 

...Wait, with what Orihara said earlier, would she be meeting Celty?

“-but all you need to do is what you’re asked,” Orihara continued, veering off onto another side street. 

Ah… Mei would have to be careful memorizing which route they were taking. She hadn’t been been on this road before, or at least not regularly, and getting lost on her way home would be a nuisance, especially at night (now that Mei knew the girl - pigtails, back to pigtails - would be okay, she was firmly trying to keep her mind on the more mundane parts of being Orihara’s accessory to kidnapping). 

“Just kick ‘em around a bit. Thanks!” Orihara abruptly hung up the phone, and Mei nodded to herself. Right, Celty fought the kidnappers. That’s how she knew they had weapons. Neat. This was jogging her memory about the show, which she supposed was good, all things considered. Knowledge and stuff could help her, definitely.

“Ah, Orihara-san, who did you call?” Mei asked, trying to keep up appearances. “Though I understand if you want to keep it a surprise.”

Orihara chuckled. “Surprises can be healthy, Suzuki-chan. Besides, humans are often captivated by urban legends and the extraordinary, and I really am interested in your genuine reactions. Well… mostly genuine, now that I spoiled it a little.”

So he really was having her meet Celty.

“I’ll try to hold my breath, then. People want what they can’t have until it’s staring them in the face, and even the most tightly held secrets are often disappointing in reality, Orihara-san. I’ll admit, I am a little curious now… but, whatever it is, I doubt it’ll be much to look at.”

You go, Mei, those are good lines! Interspersing your general outlook of expecting disappointment and expressing flippancy towards the supernatural will definitely explain any lackluster reaction to Celty. Because, in all honesty, Mei doubted that she’d be able to act the appropriate amount of surprised since she knew what was coming. Also, she sincerely doubted anything could be weirder than being spontaneously transported to another time and place, so her personal 'weird and/or supernatural' bar was set pretty high at this point.

Orihara laughed. “Oh, Suzuki-chan, I do hope you’ll eat your words. Now… how should we get to our destination?”

That last part seemed to be posed to himself, since Mei had absolutely no idea where they were going, and the appropriate answer seemed to be in the most confusing way possible. She followed Orihara weaving in and out of the streets of Ikebukuro, sometimes past the same landmark multiple times. She didn’t quite know why, but she supposed things in real life would be a bit slower than the anime. They probably just had a lot of time to kill before Celty dropped pigtails off for Orihara. Regardless, Orihara seemed to be entertained enough, smirking at his cell phone, smirking down the street, or smirking at her (she noticed he smirked a lot at everything), so she supposed it didn’t matter much. She also didn’t _quite_ remember what Orihara said to pigtails once they got to wherever he wanted to go, but surely it wasn’t too important.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Kidnapping.
> 
> It's been a while, hasn't it? Apologies, but 2020 was… well, you know. Hopefully, Mei came across as suitably horrified, but it was certainly a mixed bag during the writing process. I do find some of the dialogue lines near the beginning of this chapter really funny though. This is the tone I hope to keep for any Izaya and Mei interactions (well, either that or suitably horrified; it’s a mixed bag with those two).
> 
> As a side note, I hope that how I did the content warning label was okay. If this system didn’t really work, feel free to let me know. Because Durarara!! deals with some dark material at times, it'll probably end up becoming a recurring thing.
> 
> Thank you so much for all the support; I’m really glad that you all seem to like this fic so far. Thanks again for reading, and have a great day!


	5. Cause and Effect

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: See AN for details.

Eventually, Mei and Orihara made their way into an old, blocky concrete building in a run-down part of town. Orihara led her up to the roof, enthusiastically chattering away about his plans now that they were in a place with definitively no witnesses.

Ah, no witnesses-

Was he going to stab her for what she said earlier?

“Suzuki-chan, I’m glad I ran into you. Kidnapping people is fun, but it can get so _boring_ during the dry parts. The payoff is definitely worth it though, along with what comes after,” Orihara exclaimed, skipping around the roof and doing a little twirl before running up a set of stairs they had already descended to get to the main part of the roof. 

Hmm, it didn't seem like he would.

“Ah, up here! This will be a good hiding spot for you, don’t you think?” He was gesturing to the ladder scaling the miniature building which housed the door that went back inside. On top of it, there was a metal bin-like structure she could feasibly hide behind or blend in with.

Mei sighed before following him back up the stairs. “I really have to question your definition of fun, Orihara-san. But yes, that part of the roof does seem to be both decently hidden and in a good position to watch the main part, but hearing will definitely be an issue. Though _what_ you want me to see up here is still a mystery...”

Orihara chuckled. “Now, now. Don’t doubt me, Suzuki-chan. I’m sure you’ll be adequately entertained, even if the dialogue _is_ the best part.”

Somehow, she doubted that. She and Orihara had _very_ different opinions on what qualified as fun. 

“What you think is fun, I think is traumatizing,” Mei let out, barely being able to hide a wince as the words escaped her mouth. Damn tiredness. “Regardless, I’ll try to be a good guest.”

“Now that’s the spirit!” Orihara said, his grin turning sharp. 

Mei’s eyes scanned over the top of the building, looking for a better hiding spot. “Over there, that ledge? It seems elevated. If I climb the railings to get there and sit down, it should give me enough cover if I’m careful.”

Orihara nodded. “I suppose, but it’s a bit more visible than I would’ve liked. If you want to get the full experience though, it’s probably a better location.”

“I might as well give it a shot,” Mei added, “and there are a few structures I can hide behind if the ledge doesn't work. I’ll only be able to hear in that case, but it is what it is.”

Orihara agreed easily, and Mei walked partially down the stairs before climbing over the railing and gripping it tightly, not wanting to fall. She shifted her bag so that it was hanging off one of her arms. Pursing her lips, she carefully let one hand go, reaching over to grab the railing on the portion of the roof across from her. She stepped over the gap, climbing over the railing on the 'new' portion of the roof. Once she safely made it over to the elevated side, she sighed in relief now that the difficult part was over. Mei wasn’t particularly afraid of heights, but she also didn’t usually climb places she wasn’t supposed to. Well, outside of trees when she was a kid. 

Orihara clapped lazily, his lips twitching upwards. “Great job, Suzuki-chan!” Unfortunately, she couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or not. It was a pretty slow and lackluster climb, and she remembered him pulling off really impressive parkour moves later in the series.

Mei shrugged as she made her way over to her self-designated hiding spot. “It was functional. The real question is can I actually hide here effectively?” 

She looked down at where she originally wanted to sit. The ledge was less raised than she thought, so she’d have to lay down on the ground. That… did not appeal to her, as it looked like plenty of dirt had accumulated there over the years. With a small scowl, Mei decided to do it; she could always just wash her coat later. Peering over the edge, she blinked at Orihara, who had made his way down to the main part of the roof in the meantime.

“So, does it work?” she asked.

Orihara chuckled. “Barely, but yes.”

Abruptly, they both turned towards the front of the building as they heard the distinctive sound of a motorcycle taking off. Ah, that must’ve been- 

“It’s time for the other guest to arrive, Suzuki-chan,” Orihara said, anticipation edging into his voice. “Now, remember-”

“I got it, I got it,” Mei said, giving him a thumbs up. “I’ll try my best to stay out of sight.”

Orihara nodded, grinning. “Good, good… I’ll hide somewhere too. This is my favorite part!”

As he got into position, Mei shifted herself to hide her face below the edge, at least for the time being, and hugged herself against her tiny ledge. She let her bag serve as a pillow, trying to prevent her hair from getting dirt and dust in it. Unfortunately, even with the bag, it seemed like a lost cause. Orihara was lucky she was good at stifling her sneezes. 

As a side note, it was nice to lay down, even if the location was less than desirable. Mei had done a decent amount of running/walking/jogging today, after all.

...Maybe she should exercise more? Nah, it wasn’t like these misadventures were going to become a regular occurrence-

Mei’s thoughts cut off as she heard the sounds of footsteps on stairs. After it seemed like whoever it was had walked a decent way down, she peered over the edge to see the girl from earlier. The one who was… kidnapped. 

Yeah, that was a thing that happened, even if Mei was trying to push it out of her mind for now. 

As pigtails continued to walk down the stairs to the main part of the roof, Mei couldn’t help but appreciate the breeze running through her hair. It was nice up here, and with the pleasant spring weather on this clear night, it was a nice time to just exist. Breathing in the city air on this relatively quiet night, Mei was at peace. Well, she was, until-

“Mazenda-san,” Orihara called out, and Mei opened her eyes that she had inadvertently closed in her feeble attempts to appreciate the atmosphere. Pigtails whipped around, and Orihara walked out towards her from where he was hiding in the shadow of the stairs. “It’s nice to meet you. I’m Nakura.”

“Are you really Nakura-san?” pigtails asked, shrinking back and bringing her hand up to clutch at her purse strap.

“I’m the Nakura who wants to disappear with you,” Orihara said, a calm and pleasant expression on his face. If she didn’t know better, Mei would almost think that it was genuine. And his tone of voice too… he was practiced at this, whatever it was. Although that 'wants to disappear with you' line-

Ah. Right. He kidnapped girls wanting to commit suicide. And then saved them?

That was distinctly something from the anime and manga, now that this whole scenario was jogging her memory. That was… uncomfortable and very, very questionable. 

Admittedly, she vaguely remembered being freaked out more by the manga version when she was in high school. And it _was_ when she was in high school - early high school, at that. She’d probably seen way worse stuff in media since ( _Game Of Thrones_ , case and point). Whatever it was, as long as she put aside the fact that this was her _real life now_ , it couldn’t be that bad, right? Right.

“Yes. But how did you find out about the kidnapping?” pigtails asked, and Mei cursed internally. She must’ve missed some dialogue when she was thinking. Well, hopefully, it was just a normal conversation-

“Easy, I’m the one who had them kidnap you,” he admitted, unashamed. Ah, Mei spoke too soon, didn’t she? Well, at least it couldn’t get any worse- “And I had them rescue you as well.”

Orihara gestured to himself, his face was still fixed into that pleasantly calm expression. Pigtails’ expression, on the other hand, was slipping into the nervously horrified range.

“What do you mean?” the younger girl asked.

Mei consoled herself. Orihara could recover from this, surely-

“Let’s recap the last few moments of your life, shall we? You were scared when you were kidnapped despite the fact that you wanted to die in the first place, which made you mad. Now, if you fought back against your kidnappers, you’d be denying the part of you that wanted to die, so you decided to give up and accept your fate,” Orihara lectured, walking up to the railing. “But now that you’re safe and sound, you’re thrilled you didn’t die. I wanted to see the look on your face when I told you that.” At that last line, he leaned over on the railing and looked back at pigtails, narrowing his eyes.

Right! Or he could psychoanalyze a kid who wanted to kill herself only a few hours ago. Decidedly not cool. Belatedly, Mei admitted it was foolish to believe that Orihara could ever hold a normal conversation, especially when his way of getting a waiter or waitress’ attention was to yeet a hot drink at them.

Pigtails gasped, and Mei honestly couldn’t blame her.

“In short, I wanted to see the look on your face when someone saw straight through you,” he said with a smile, turning around once again and resting his arms on the railing. Briefly, his eyes flickered up to Mei. She was too distracted by what he was saying to care.

He was making it worse for the poor girl by reitterating his dumb point. Terrible, 0/10.

“Why?” pigtails asked shakily. 

Mei had to admit that was a good question. Why did Orihara do anything that he did? Other than _something something immortality_ and _gotta steal Celty’s head_. Unfortunately, she doubted that pigtails would get her answer.

“Why? Let me see… This will sound a tad philosophical to you, but you look like a smart girl, so I think you’ll be able to understand. I just love humans,” he said, chirping the last part. Ah, the famous 'I love humans' speech she had ever-so-unfortunately interrupted by calling him a furry. So it _was_ an explanation, just a really abstract one. “Humans are the most interesting creatures there are. Oh, and when I say I love humans, I mean all humans. Not you specifically. Keep that in mind.” Orihara adopted his trademarked smirk, and pigtails blushed.

Again, Mei couldn’t blame her. Just because he was an asshole didn’t mean that Orihara wasn’t aesthetically pleasing. Unfortunately. 

“So then… you lied?” pigtails asked.

“You’re getting the picture? How wonderful. Come here,” Orihara grabbed pigtails’ wrist and dragged her over to the other side of the railing, only a step or two away from the end of the building’s roof. He looked over the side of the building, though from where Mei was, she couldn’t really tell if he was looking at something in specific or just the pavement down below.

“A lot of people have jumped from here,” Orihara continued. “Not so many as to call it really famous, but it’s high enough that you’re certain to die. See that stain down there?” Pigtails leaned over to get a better look, and Mei winced. She saw what Orihara was getting at, and she _really_ hoped he wasn’t going to actually _say_ it. Besides, one wrong move and they could easily- “You think you’re special, don’t you?”

Oh no, she _really_ didn’t like where this was going.

“You aren’t. Everyone’s the same,” he said, starting to walk across the slightly elevated edge of the building like a tightrope. “Everyone lies. Everyone hides things. No one makes it through this life being _completely_ honest. You’ve got a secret or two, right? Have you ever thought about why it’s okay for you to keep secrets but not your parents?” He turned around, facing pigtails, and dramatically pointed to the sky. His eyes briefly flicked up to Mei again, seemingly looking for something; she tried her best to keep her face blank.

God, the worst part about watching this whole disaster play out for Mei (and oh boy, was it turning into an absolute _disaster_ of a conversation) was either the fact that she could tell Orihara was having _just so much fun_ relaying this information to pigtails or the fact that everything he was saying was _technically_ correct. It didn’t mean any of this had to be said, though. It really didn’t.

“Well… I-” pigtails (no, the girl - calling her pigtails wasn’t really helping Mei distract herself from the horror of the situation anymore) started, but Orihara cut her off.

“To get straight to the point, I think that if you’re having an affair or if your spouse knows,” Orihara started, walking back towards the girl and getting all up in her face, “you still laugh at the same dumb jokes. You keep eating the same sweet stew. You just keep _going-_ ”

The girl, looking flustered, moved to slap Orihara - and again, three for three, Mei couldn't blame her as _wow some of that stuff seemed personal_ \- but she lost her balance. Mei could only look on in abject horror as the teen toppled over in slow motion, about to fall off the building when Orihara snatched her wrist, barely holding her aloft and securing his other hand firmly on the railing. She moved to help the duo, but Orihara looked up at her and shook his head before turning back to the younger girl, manic glee barely hidden in his eyes.

“Look,” he stated. “Whatever their worries may have been, they’re just stains on the pavement now. Stains, without exception. All of them. Equal before God… Want me to let go?”

Oh. Oh wow. He just… said that. Holy shit. What an asshole. What an absolutely _terrible_ person. Why, exactly, did she tag along again?

Slowly, Orihara pulled the younger girl back up until she was standing firmly on the edge of the roof, and he put both his hands on her shoulders for a moment before turning away.

“Well, I gotta bounce," he said, vaulting over the railing. “Thanks for proving how ugly and immature you are, it’s been real.” He then… gave the teen a one handed finger gun as he insulted her. Huh. And… he’s really saying that? The fuck? 

Unfortunately, Mei had to admit it was morbidly hilarious with how he was acting. He was just so _happy_ about insulting the poor girl. She knew she shouldn’t be laughing, she _really_ shouldn’t be laughing, but Mei had to really fight herself to make sure she wasn’t even though what he was saying was Legitimately Terrible. Even then, her body was still shaking. It was just horrifically entertaining.

...Wait, Orihara was glancing up at her. And smirking. Shit, he knew she was laughing at the poor girl. This was… not ideal. Wow, it really hit Mei that she was a terrible person. She supposed Orihara was too, for instigating all of this, but she was the one who found it funny. In real life. As a bystander. Not, like, behind a screen. Damn.

“It isn’t your problems I’m really interested in. I just wanted to see how you handled yourself,” Orihara continued as he climbed up the stairs, doing a little hop once he reached the top. “By the way, you were just as I pegged you. Really quite boring. I knew you never really wanted to kill yourself. See you! It was fun, Mazenda-san.” He closed the door firmly behind him, and Mei was left gaping. 

He really just kept going, didn't he? Insulting a suicidal girl. Which… _wow_ , that was _way_ worse than she thought it was going to be, but she totally should’ve seen it coming. Doubly so since she actually _watched this anime before, what the heck, Mei._

Ah, right. Orihara was gone now. He just… left. Would he wait for her on the ground floor? Or would he go on without her?

What he said to… Mazenda-san (that name didn’t sound right, and for some reason, she _really_ wanted to say the other girl’s name was Rio) was hurtful, sure. Very hurtful. But she’d be fine, and Mei… she needed to find her way home, with or without Orihara. At the very least, she should probably ask him how to get back to Russia Sushi to check that her memorized directions were somewhat correct, if extraneous with the route he had them take. Unfortunately, she couldn’t exactly move from her position without being noticed, so she had to wait for Mazenda-san to leave. Mei watched the other girl idly, waiting for an opening when-

No. Oh God, no-

The younger girl leaned forwards in slow motion, about to jump, and Mei shifted, grabbing her bag and gripping her hands tightly on the ledge before throwing herself over it. She let herself dangle from the wall for a split second, feeling the strain on her arms, before letting go. She only dropped about a foot or two before landing in a crouch, instantly whipping around and bolting towards the railing where the girl once stood. 

Shit, that took too long! Of course she didn’t make it in time, she _never_ made it in time-

Mazenda-san was too far away for Mei to help, and internally, she knew it was a lost cause long before she even set her hands on that ledge. The only thing Mei could do was watch, horror spread across her face as she saw the younger girl fall and fall and-

Get rescued by a shadow net before she hit the ground. Huh. Footsteps sounded off behind her, and Mei tensed before the person chuckled. Ah, it was just Orihara. Not… well, not anyone else dangerous. It was a small consolation. 

...Wait, how did he get back on the roof so fast?

The shadows gently set Mazenda-san to the ground, and Mei scanned the alley for-

Ah, there was Celty. The headless rider looked up at her briefly before walking forwards to talk to the younger girl-

Shit, Celty saw her. It was sheer luck Mazenda-san didn’t, having her eyes closed during the fall. Mei quickly scrambled away from the edge of the roof, scowling. That… probably wasn’t good that Celty saw her there. She most likely thought that Mei was one of Oriahara’s accomplices (she shuddered, because she technically was at this point, but… details). 

Also, Mei looked like a trash gremlin from laying in all that dirt and dust. Definitely not ideal.

Well, there goes one awkward first impression she’ll never get over.

“Ah, Suzuki-chan, so easily scared by the supernatural, I never would’ve thought-” Orihara began, but Mei cut him off.

“I’m not scared. Just… worried. That figure - the headless rider, right? - saw me when I was leaning over the railing,” Mei corrected before berating herself internally. That… well, Mei really needed to stop talking like that to important people. Her tone of voice there was a bit harsh. She knew that. If she ever actually would, though, was another issue entirely.

“I thought you didn’t believe in stuff like that? Going off of your comment from earlier, I mean. Aren’t I such a good person, showing you the error of your ways?” Orihara grinned, gesturing to the alley down below.

“...It’s not that I don’t believe in it,” Mei began, carefully weighing her words, perhaps for the first time in any encounter with Orihara. “It’s just that it’s extremely unlikely that any given event has a genuine supernatural explanation. Most rumors and stuff like that are just way more liable to having perfectly mundane ones.”

Orihara hummed. “I suppose that’s an outlook you could have… Hey, I know! Why don’t we go meet the headless rider, Suzuki-chan? Here, follow me!” He bounced back towards the staircase, leaning forward on its rails when he realized Mei was being slow to follow. “Come on!” He did a little hop, and after turning back to look at that railing near the building’s edge one last time, Mei followed him.

* * *

Orihara led Mei out to a main street in a better lit part of town (Mei, once again, tried to memorize where they were going, but she was beginning to think that it was a lost cause), and he spun around to grin at her before leaning back on a tree. “Now, they should be here- ah, there they are.”

A woman in a black bodysuit with a catlike yellow and blue motorcycle helmet sped up to them, barely stopping in time to avoid a collision with Orihara. Mei twitched, secretly a bit jealous of how calm he was after almost being hit by a motorcycle. That took nerves of steel.

“I didn’t hear you’d turned into a defender of the innocent,” Orihara stated, and wow, he was already damning this conversation into the definitely-not-normal category, okay. “See, I thought I hired you for your skills as a talented courier.”

After a beat, Celty’s shoulders sagged, and she turned, typing away at her phone. Or was it a PDA? Mei had never seen one before, so she was just going to call it a phone in her head, propriety be damned. The headless woman then turned to Mei - which kind of surprised her since all she’d been doing for the past few seconds was standing there awkwardly - and showed her the device.

_Who are you? And what are you doing with him?_

"Oh, I’m Suzuki Mei. He threw drinks at me before proceeding to kidnap me on my way home. I'm in mortal danger. Please help me," Mei stated before wincing internally. She _really_ needed a better mind to mouth filter. Orihara burst out laughing, and Celty merely stared blankly at the duo. Shaking her head (or was it helmet?), the headless rider took out her phone and began typing away.

_He kidnapped you? Are you okay?_

Orihara chuckled. “She’s joking, really. Suzuki-chan tagged along of her own free will.”

“Ah… that’s debatable. Although I was mostly joking, courier-san. I apologize for any confusion,” Mei replied awkwardly, feeling bad at her attempt at sarcasm after remembering that _oh yeah, she’d just helped Orihara kidnap a literal child_ and that _maybe_ joking about being _kidnapped_ wasn’t an appropriate response. Yeah… it was all starting to catch up with her now. She would blame being stressed for her poor reply, really, but it didn’t make her any less of a terrible person. Celty tilted her helmet and, somehow, looked exceedingly confused.

“Well, Suzuki-chan, it’s been a nice few hours, but we should be going now,” Orihara chimed in. “Do you need anyone to walk you home? This city can be quite dangerous at night.” 

Mei first thought it was nice of him to ask, but upon noting that his smile looked anything but sincere (it was rather intimidatingly sharp, actually) she decided that no, he wasn’t doing it to be nice. And thinking about it a little more critically, she realized the erratic way he dragged her there wasn’t just to waste time; it was to make her lose her sense of direction.

Why would he want to walk her home? What could he get out of-

Oh, he wanted to know where she lived, but he didn't want to just ask like a normal person. Or at least that was the only thing she could think of for why he would offer. She didn’t know for sure _why_ he wanted to know, but it _was_ Orihara; it was probably for something sinister, and the best she could hope for if she took his offer was to merely be annoyed into coming on more of these horrifying little adventures. Which… well, she really didn’t want.

Honestly, she would rate this miniature fiasco a 2/10 with the ‘2’ being because she got free food out of it.

“...Thanks for the offer, but no thanks. I don’t particularly trust you right now,” the woman replied. Yeah, that was a normal response, right? Maybe?

Orihara sighed dramatically. “But I thought we bonded on this little adventure! You seemed entertained enough, and friends who kidnap together-”

Celty’s motorcycle neighed (ah, Mei belatedly remembered that it was also a horse; that was a thing, right?), and she shoved her phone out in front of the two of them.

_I can take her home, it’s fine. I can pick up some food for Shinra that way._

Mei blinked before dropping into a low bow. “Thank you so much, courier-san. I greatly appreciate it.” Ah… ‘greatly appreciate it?’ Who even says that? Mei noticed her conversation skills diminishing by the second, which was quite an accomplishment considering her previous blunder. 

Orihara merely shrugged. “Well, if that’s what you want, Suzuki-chan, then who am I to stop you? I won’t be paying for it though, talented courier-san,” he said, and Celty typed out another message on her phone.

_I said it’s fine. Where do you live, Suzuki-san?_

“It’s in Ikebukuro. If you go to Russia Sushi, I can point you in the right direction from there. Ah… you do know where that is, right?” Mei asked, not quite sure if Celty ever really had a reason to go there, but Celty nodded before motioning for the other woman to get on the bike. Mei obliged the unspoken request, placing her uniform bag between herself and the headless rider. After adjusting her beige coat so that it wouldn't get caught in the motorcycle (even after brushing it off, it was still quite dirty), she paused, not quite knowing where to put her hands. After an awkward (at least to Mei) moment, she spoke up.

“Is it alright if I hold onto you? I, uh, don’t want to fall off,” she said, though she somehow doubted she would even if she didn’t. The bike seemed alive somehow, and it could probably catch her if it felt like it. 

...Wait, did that even make sense? Mei bemoaned the fact that her thoughts were getting weirder by the second too.

Celty typed out a quick confirmation before asking her not to yell, and before Mei could ask why, she saw shadows coalesce in front of her face into a helmet atop her head. Absentmindedly, she raised her hands to feel it, and it had a very smooth and soft texture while still being absurdly sturdy.

“Huh… that’s neat,” Mei let out, blinking. “Really cool, thanks.” Orihara chuckled from the sidewalk. Ah, Mei had forgotten about him.

“Yes, yes - the supernatural can be pretty intriguing,” he commented, amused at her reactions. “See you, Suzuki-chan. And thanks again, talented courier-san. It was fun.” He then skipped off, pulling out his phone. 

Mei wrapped her arms around Celty’s torso (she hasn’t hugged someone in a long time - wait, does this count as a hug?) and spared one more glance towards Orihara’s bouncing fluffy hood before Celty pulled off into traffic. As they merged onto the highway, Mei couldn’t help but noting that although she’d never ridden a motorcycle before and had no points for comparison, riding with Celty sure did feel a lot like flying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Mentions of kidnapping and suicide. Nothing worse than in canon, but it should be noted all the same.
> 
> In this chapter I used a mix of the sub and dub dialogue for the canon-ish scenes. I liked certain parts of Izaya's characterization in each version, so this was my compromise. As a side note, Izaya is definitely meaner in the dub, or at least he is when comparing the two on VRV. In the future, I’ll try to cut down on the canon dialogue more when it does crop up, but for now, I had to keep most of it since it’s so important to Izaya’s character (and Mei's reactions to it helps to establish her character too, so this whole scenario really sets a good baseline for them). Also, trying to format Celty's dialogue was… weird. I ended up just dropping the dialogue tags and going for italics.
> 
> Next time is more of a recovery chapter for Mei, so that’s nice. Thanks again for reading, and have a great day!


	6. A Shaky Resolution

As they sped about on the back of Celty’s motorcycle, Mei let the wind roaring past them and the sounds of traffic rushing by consume her. Her constant stream of thoughts reeled back a little, allowing her to just appreciate where she was. To appreciate the nice city night and-

Ah, her coat had come loose. It whipped around frantically as Celty sped up, and Mei could barely repress her sigh. All that effort to tuck it away earlier was for nothing, huh? Oh, earlier-

“You were wondering what I was doing with Orihara,” Mei remembered abruptly. Well, considering the woman  _ was  _ driving her home… “Would you like a serious response?"

Celty stiffened before nodding, still looking at the road ahead of her.

Mei paused. What she said earlier was largely true, but it was delivered a bit bluntly. How could she…? Hmm, that should work.

“He really did throw a drink at me, and he did see me on my way home from work. When he asked me to tag along, I was too scared to say no. Not that that's a good excuse or reason - it's kind of a dumb one, but I'm dumb so… there, I guess. It was just bad luck, really,” Mei rambled, tiredness seeping into her voice. Celty listened attentively before glancing back to her and nodding, accepting the explanation.

Although, as Mei noted earlier, maybe it wasn’t luck. Orihara had a habit of knowing a bit too much about everything for it to be a reasonable factor. Yet she still went along with him. That meant-

Mei cut herself off. She was far too tired to come to a solid conclusion about the night's events. It was better to wait until tomorrow morning. To wait until she was more emotionally distant from the situation. It would help her make a solid judgement about how to move forward (and about… herself, and her inadequate responses).

Celty revved the bike, and it neighed loudly as they turned a corner. From the edge of her vision, Mei saw a flash of green, white, and yellow among the small crowd watching the infamous headless rider drive past. Those colors seemed familiar, so she glanced back before abruptly turning away. It was those two kids again. Right… that was why she was here in the first place. The plot.

It was a short ride past Russia Sushi to Mei’s apartment from there. The distance between her home and work seemed to pass in the blink of an eye, and Mei internally bemoaned the fact that she couldn’t own or drive a vehicle anymore due to her lack of appropriate identification. Well, she supposed she  _ could  _ drive since as long as she obeyed traffic laws, the chances of her being pulled over were miniscule. It’s not illegal if you don’t get caught, after all. However, considering her current situation, she really shouldn’t risk it. Bad Mei.

Celty pulled into the small parking lot in front of the old apartment complex, and Mei stifled back a yawn. It was a long night, even if it was only… wait, what time was it? From Celty’s phone earlier, back when they were talking with Orihara… well, Mei would estimate it was somewhere past nine. So not late at all, really. 

Once the bike slowed to a halt, Mei dismounted and bowed to the headless rider, her messy hair falling down into her face as the helmet Celty had loaned her dissolved back into shadows. She bit back a sneeze from all the dust it had collected earlier.

“Thanks again for driving me home,” Mei said sincerely, standing back up and shifting her bag (which had somehow survived the tumultuous journey in one piece) around in her hands. “I really appreciate it.”

Celty nodded but didn’t leave right away. After a moment, she brought out her phone, contemplating something before nervously typing out a message to show to Mei.

_ I understand that you didn't really mean to be here tonight, _ it began,  _ but please, be careful around him in the future. It's not safe. _

Mei nodded. “I know. I’ll… try to be better about it. Thanks again for the ride.” And with that, the brown-haired woman walked up to the door of her apartment, keys in hand, and firmly closed the door behind her.

* * *

The next morning, the woman climbed out of her futon, groggy and slow. Her hair was a tangled mess, and she yawned as she rubbed at her green eyes. With a glance at the cheap battery-operated alarm clock on the floor, she sighed. She woke up twenty minutes early, which was just enough to be a nuisance. It'd be impossible for her to go back to sleep, so she just should get ready for work.

As Mei (wait, that wasn't her real name-) threw together a bowl of cereal, rummaging through her cabinets and fridge, the events from last night clawed away at the edges of her mind. Again, she sighed. She had to address it or else it would bother her all day. Hell, it might do so regardless.

In order to prevent herself from rambling too much, and thus postponing any actually meaningful processing of said events, the woman decided to lay out the facts as succinctly as she could.

First, what happened? She went along with Orihara and helped him kidnap a suicidal teenager, watching idly from the sidelines as he insulted her. Well… not idly. She may have found parts of it amusing. Maybe. Or-

No, no excuses. She did find it funny due to his charismatic delivery. She had to accept that; however, she also found the actual kidnapping deeply disturbing. And she never actually wanted the girl to off herself.

Now, taking all of that together, how did that make her feel? Conflicted was the first word that came to mind. She  _ really _ should have done something to stop the kidnapping. Her reasons for not doing so were somewhat justified at the time. Hell, they still were. She was just too plain  _ weak _ to make a difference, and it would've happened anyways so-

Ah, there was her problem: ‘it would've happened anyways.’ Didn't the woman resolve to stop treating this as a story? To treat the characters - no, the  _ people _ \- here like anyone else?

This also explained how she was able to brush it all off, to some degree. By inadvertently allowing the lines to blur between reality and fiction until things only mattered when she felt like it.

Given her… _peculiar_ situation, it was understandable how this came about. Understandable but not forgivable. She watched a girl get _kidnapped_ _right in front of her_ and was able to brush it off. She regretted it, but not as much as she should have.

No, not nearly as much her ‘biggest regret’ (a few of the women's old memories flashed to the forefront: a pale blonde girl getting taunted by a group of middle schoolers, one of those middle schoolers slamming a hockey stick again and again across her own shins until they bled-) and that was a problem. Being unable to stand up to a couple of middle school bullies for an acquaintance (a friend, she could've been a  _ friend _ -) shouldn't be nearly as horrifying as the kidnapping and taunting of a suicidal teen. Objectively speaking, that is, which demonstrated her internal disconnect between the reality she once knew and the reality she had been forced into. 

Despite this disconnect, one fact remained the same: in both cases, she did nothing. Even after she promised herself years ago that she'd shape up.

A not-so-small part of Mei's mind protested the last thought; standing up to a feared informant and people who  _ kidnapped  _ others for a living was very different from standing up to some schoolyard bullies, no matter how much she hated the latter.

The rest of her pushed that protest back. Her problem in both cases was inaction, and she had to fix it. 

She had to commit wholly to her earlier decision. If she wanted to treat the people here like it wasn't an anime anymore, she'd have to treat the  _ world  _ like that as well. The woman couldn't keep half-assing it; she had to interfere as she would normally. She had to live without regrets. In other words, fuck the plot, especially if a kid was going to get hurt because of it. Yes, she still had to be careful, and yes, the world of  _ Durarara!! _ could be pretty violent at times. As a result, she shouldn't ignore her foreknowledge entirely, but she could always just use it as a general heads up when applicable.

However, if she really wanted to live with no regrets, she had to be able to step up, take charge, and actually  _ help  _ people instead of being a  _ goddamn bystander  _ like before. In other words, she had to stop being weak. She had to get comfortable in a fist fight. She had to get rid of her  _ goddamn noodle arms _ . Thankfully, like with her initial money problem, there was actually something she could do about that.

She might not get involved in everything. Even thinking about it now, she knew that'd be impossible. No way in hell she could be in multiple places at once, nor did she want to be. It wasn't her place to play God with the plot. But at the bare minimum, if something like that happened right in front of her again, she had to do something. And at the bare minimum, she should be prepared to do so even with the health hazards of this city.

Her overall morals might not be exactly conventional, and she would certainly turn a blind eye to  _ some  _ things (mainly the yakuza, she  _ really  _ didn't want to get involved with the yakuza), but if she stayed a bystander this whole damn time, she was no better than those schoolyard bullies. 

She'd try not to let something like that happen again. She'd really try, but only time would tell if she'd be able to stick to it.

* * *

Another thing the woman noticed, though she pointedly ignored it while she was at work, was that she was getting used to being called ‘Mei’ or ‘Suzuki-san.’ This wasn't necessarily a bad thing, as being slow to respond to what was supposed to be her own name would be just plain weird (and she'd unfortunately had quite a few close calls in the past), but she didn't like it. Especially since she was calling herself that in her own mind at times instead of her old name. It was uncomfortable, and the woman feared that she'd someday forget who she used to be, even if she logically knew it was a silly fear. It was just… weird but unfortunately inevitable.

Regardless, some time had passed since her misadventure with Orihara, and it was now time to hang out with the van squad. Since school had officially started, the woman was back to evening shifts and could spend the afternoon messing around with Erika, Walker, Kyouhei, and Saburo. It'd be a nice respite. Hanging out with her new tentative friends could be… good for her.

Unfortunately, she had to leave her beige coat behind. She had grown rather fond of it, but the cut was rather distinctive. After her ride home with Celty… well, someone could recognize her and bother her for information about the headless rider, which wasn't ideal. She respected Celty's privacy, and some of the rumor-chasers in this city could be rather unsavory at times. Mei didn't really want to get involved with people like that in person. It was better just to buy a new coat, which led to her current predicament.

“So, what do you want to do today, Mei-chan?” Erika asked. “Of course, Walker and I are definitely gonna go check out that book signing first. After, we could stay at the comic book store, go to a cosplay cafe, or-”

“Oh, there’s this maid cafe I want to check out near the park!” Walker interjected. 

That might be fun. There were a ton themed cafes in the city, and that was something the woman thought was determinedly lacking in America. As far as dining options go, she wouldn’t mind trying one.

“I’d rather go to a cat cafe if we have to do a themed one,” Saburo chimed in. 

Cats  _ were _ pretty cute, and she hadn’t been able to pet one in a while. Erika seemed torn. Walker looked ready to enthusiastically defend his choice in dining before Kyouhei walked over. He accidentally left his wallet in the van, so he went back to go grab it.

“It’s a pretty nice day, so we could always just go for a walk around the park,” he added, handing the keys back to Saburo. 

Erika frowned. “That’s kinda lame, Dotachin. And it doesn’t help out with food.”

“Well, I do have to go shopping this week,” Mei cut in. “Maybe we could swing by a thrift store at some point? We can always decide on food later.” Erika nodded, and Walker shrugged. Saburo muttered an affirmation.

“Yeah, I’m not that hungry right now anyways,” Kyouhei added. “We can always split into two groups later, depending on where we want to grab a snack.” This seemed to be a popular suggestion, and they started walking over to Toranoana-

Ah, Saburo’s phone was going off, and it actually sounded kind of familiar. Some teens were talking about an idol one day at work, playing a video out loud in their booths. What was the name again?

“Hijiribi Ruri-san, right?” Mei mused, and Saburo nodded as he checked his phone.

“Yeah, you know her?” he asked. “I really love her music- Wait, shit. Something came up, I gotta run. Catch you guys later!” With a quick wave, he ran off in the direction of where he parked the van a block or two down the street. 

Kyouhei blinked. “That was… sudden.”

“It’s probably just work,” Walker added. “He’ll tell us later if it’s something important.”

Erika nodded. “Yeah. For now, let’s just catch that book signing.”

The four of them started walking towards their destination, catching up on whatever happened since they last met up. Just as they passed a parking lot though, Erika’s face lit up in recognition.

“Kida-kun!” she called, waving.

“Hey hey,” the blond kid greeted.

Oh, those were the two kids from earlier! The ones who were part of the main cast, and the ones Mei saw that confirmed her place in the timeline during her little sidequest with Orihara. Hell, they were even wearing Raira uniforms.

“Uh, the guy with the manga name… Mikado-kun! That’s it,” Walker exclaimed, and Mei paused. Their names were Kida and Mikado, then? That was good to know. The one dubbed Mikado looked over at her curiously.

“Oh! This is Suzuki Mei, she works at Russia Sushi,” Erika introduced, catching his gaze, and Mei gave the two teens a small bow.

“It’s nice to meet you,” she said.

“I’m Ryuugamine Mikado,” the black-haired teen said, bowing back. “It’s nice to meet you too.”

“And I’m the one and only Kida Masaomi,” the blond said, bowing dramatically. “And don’t you forget it!”  Kida looked like he was going to say something else, but Erika let out a small laugh, cutting him off. 

“Anyways, wanna hit Toranoana?” she said.

Walker grinned, pulling a manga volume out of his bag. “Suzie Yasuda-sensei’s having a book signing today!”

Kyouhei stepped back before turning to Walker, embarrassed. “Don’t be so loud about stuff like that!”

“Huh? What for? I can’t get enough of Suzie-sensei’s books. They’re so cool!”

Mikado looked nervously between the two, and the woman figured she might as well make this a little less awkward.

“Ah, don’t worry about it,” she said, turning to address the two teens. “So, how’d school go?”

Shit, that was still awkward. She was now officially the weird, boring adult who asked about school.

“Yeah, wasn’t it the entrance ceremony today?” Erika chimed in, and the woman internally let out a sigh of relief. Erika was a life saver, turning her awkward question into something actually reasonable. 

“-they’re for freakin’ kids,” Kyouhei argued, and Mei had to hide a wince. Hearing your interests looked down on as something ‘just for kids’ was hurtful, even if she knew Kyouhei was just embarrassed and didn’t mean anything bad by it.

“It was fine,” Mikado replied.

Kida patted his friend on the back. “It was better than fine! There was this really cute chick, and-”

“Masaomi!” Mikado cut his friend off, blushing profusely. "It's nothing like that!" 

Kyouhei and Walker’s argument continued in the background, and Kida grinned, opening his mouth to tease his friend before-

"A‐Anyways, do you guys know anything about the Dollars?" Mikado asked, turning to her and Erika. Mei blinked, a little confused. Wasn’t he the leader of the Dollars? If anyone should know anything about the maybe-a-gang, it should be him. "I've been hearing a lot about them lately."

Kyouhei and Walker grew quiet, turning their attention back towards the conversation. Erika hummed, and the woman didn’t let any of her confusion show on her face past the initial blink. That could be… well, not bad with her current crowd, but definitely not ideal.

“The Dollars?” Walker repeated, tilting his head. “They got a continuous duel with the Flame Haze sealed within the basement of Sunshine 60, right?”

“You got it wrong, Yumacchi,” Erika exclaimed. “That’s the angel who flies through the sky, flashing her panties and shouting ‘pipirupirupiru!’”

Mei was… a bit lost at this point. She was pretty sure the van squad were all Dollars members, so maybe they were just having fun spreading crazy rumors?

Kyouhei stared impassively at Mikado as the teen looked down at his hands. “What are you askin’ about the Dollars for, anyways?”

Mikado looked up. “Nothing, I was just curious.”

Mei hummed, not wanting to spoil their fun directly. “Well, since they’re a colorless color gang, they could be anywhere. It’s probably best not to ask about them so openly.” 

There, a nice noncommittal yet accurate response. The second part was particularly true as they were still standing in the middle of a sidewalk in broad daylight, not that the woman was particularly worried at the moment. 

“Did that story ya heard earlier scare ya?” Kida asked his friend after briefly glancing at the woman. Ah, was that a bad response? Maybe she was just overthinking it.

“I’ve heard a lot of rumors about them. Word is they’re pretty dangerous,” Kyouhei warned.

“Oh, I see…” Mikado said, trailing off.

“You shouldn’t go near them just for kicks,” he continued. “The less you know about those guys, the better.”

“Kadota-san is so freakin’ cool,” Walker said, turning to Kyouhei. “You’re the wise older brother character.”

“Or do you get girls with daddy issues who call you ‘papa’?” Erika chimed in, and Kyouhei was blushing and very, very embarrassed.

“No, no,” Walker said. “He’s-”

“Shut up!” Kyouhei objected, fed up with… whatever this was. Mei's lips twitched up into a small smile, and she just shook her head. Mikado was back to looking down at the ground.

“Well, we should probably get going if we want to make it to that book signing,” Mei spoke up. 

Walker turned to her. “Ah, you’re right! Catch you later, Mikado-kun, Kida-kun!” he said, giving Kyouhei some space again. The other man let out a small sigh of relief.

“Yeah, see you later!” Erika said before grabbing the woman’s arm and dragging her off. She tensed up, a little awkward at first, but quickly tried to relax. It was just Erika. Friends… do that sometimes, right? 

The rest of the group said their goodbyes, and Mikado and Kida split off to do their own thing. The woman pondered her financial situation as they left. She’d been working quite a lot, so she did have some extra money… no, she should probably save it. Maybe she could buy some manga next month? Yeah, maybe she could pick up a volume of  _ Black Butler _ .

* * *

After the book signing finished up, the four of them made their way over to a thrift store. It was one that Erika had recommended since she had used it in the past for gathering cosplay materials. She said some pretty cool stuff turned up there from time to time, and after walking in and seeing an honest-to-goodness  _ katana  _ on the wall for some reason, Mei was inclined to believe her.

Wait, a katana? Wasn’t that a thing that showed up in the show too? Not this specific sword but-

Right, a demon sword named Saika was involved in the slasher attacks. Those were just starting up, actually, as she had heard a rumor about someone getting stabbed towards the end of her shift yesterday.

The woman shuddered internally. That was another thing to avoid if she could. That demon sword could possess people. The thought of not being in control of herself terrified her, which was part of the reason she avoided alcohol even if she could technically drink.

“Hey, that sword’s pretty cool,” Walker said as they walked in. “Looks like something straight out of a manga!” 

She nodded in agreement, shoving her thoughts on Saika aside and keeping a lookout for where they kept their jackets and coats. It was getting warmer, but since she had the money and no real place to store it (no identity meant no bank account, after all), she might as well pick it up now.

“Totally! Though it’d probably be a pain to bring home,” Erika added.

Kyouhei sighed. “Yeah, a sword's probably a bad idea. What are you looking for anyways, Mei-san?” 

The woman paused for a second, just noticing her desired section, before replying. “A new coat.”

“Why? You’re old one was pretty cool,” Erika asked, following her as she walked over to the coat rack.

Mei shrugged, not really wanting to lie to them. They were nice, and it wasn’t like she had to be on guard with them all the time like she was with Orihara, so- “I guess you can say it’s a bit too recognizable. That’s not a bad thing on its own, but I was seen with someone popular in the city a few nights ago. As a result, I should probably wear something else for a while.”

Walker nodded, bringing a hand up to his chin in contemplation. “Yeah, it’s a pretty distinctive cut. Almost like a trench coat or something.”

“It wasn’t Izaya-kun again, was it?” Erika asked, narrowing her eyes. 

Kyouhei looked over. “If he ever bothers you, you know we can help, right?”

Ah, Erika must’ve told them about the warm drink thing. That was… fine. And understandable. Orihara was dangerous, but-

“Kind of? He was there too, but it’s not why I need a new coat,” the woman said, skirting around the issue. “It's because I rode home on the black bike.” Kyouhei blinked, and Walker’s face lit up. Erika’s did too, but it quickly faded into suspicion.

“Really? That’s so cool!” Walker exclaimed. “What were they like?”

“They were just… a person? The motorcycle neighed like a horse, which was kind of interesting,” Mei replied, flustered. She was trying to keep her answer specific enough to be genuine but vague enough as to not implicate Celty as someone supernatural. “They also communicated by typing on a device and then showing it to me, so they might be mute. They were really nice.”

“That’s pretty cool-”

“Why was Izaya-kun there?” Erika cut in. “You didn’t get hurt, did you?”

The woman blinked. Erika seemed  _ protective _ of her. She hadn’t had a friend ask something like that in… well, she couldn’t remember. Then again, she usually didn’t get stuck trailing around after one of the most dangerous men in the city either.

“He wanted me to watch something, I guess. I got some free food out of it, and no one got hurt, so it’s fine,” she explained, downplaying the severity of the situation. Technically, the kidnappers may have gotten hurt, but that wasn’t really important to her. Having her newfound friends fight Orihara for her was probably not a good idea, even if they could handle themselves well in one (from what she remembered, at least). Besides, it wasn’t  _ that _ bad- 

Okay, Mei admitted that it probably was, but she still didn’t think she needed outside help. All she had to do was run away if he ever showed up again. Which he probably wouldn’t. Because Mikado was in town.

Damn, she was already throwing some poor kid to the wolves to preserve her own safety, huh? So much for resolving to help other people.

...Well, she’d just have to help those she cared about first. Everyone else could figure shit out on their own.

“Really?” Erika asked, and the woman nodded. “Fine then. I… guess meeting the black bike is cool. Just be careful, okay?”

“I’ve been trying, honestly,” Mei said, going back to scanning through the coats when- “Oh. This is… wow.”

It was an honest-to-goodness black biker jacket straight out of the 90s, and feeling the texture, it seemed to be real leather too. It was a good price, and just like-

Kyouhei whistled. “Damn, that’s a cool jacket. Is it your size?”

The woman took it off the coat hanger and slipped it on. It was a little on the big side, but not by much; it was just enough to be comfy. The familiar weight felt reassuring on her shoulders.

“That looks totally badass,” Walker chimed in. 

Erika nodded. “Definitely. It’s still a little distinctive though…”

“It’s perfect,” she said, grinning. “Absolutely perfect.”

The woman took the coat off and brought it to the front of the shop for purchase. The leather was a bit worn, but all the zippers were in working condition. She absolutely needed this jacket.

After all, it would be good to have a little piece of home back with her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Going back and editing these chapters before cross-posting them over here has made me realize how far I’ve come since I started writing this. For edits, I limit myself to grammar, not content or structure, so it’s interesting to see some details, big and small, that I would’ve done differently if I were to write them now. For example, I wouldn't have written chapter 5 the same (I would’ve cut the canon dialogue significantly more at minimum, but realistically, major overhauls probably would’ve been done). Chapter 8, which I still have to post over here, would’ve been somewhat different too. The fact that I’m noticing this shows that I’m growing as a writer (which was my goal for this project), so that’s good.
> 
> Speaking of posting, I plan to upload chapters weekly over here until chapter 14 hits. This way I’ll be able to catch up to ffn (I’ll be uploading once every two weeks over there) by that point. I have drafts of chapters 10-14 done with the exception of one paragraph in chapter 14, so it should be a fun time. Thanks again for reading, and have a great week!


	7. Personal Improvement

The outing with the van squad was definitely the highlight of her week. It was a good break with good company, and she got a totally badass jacket out of it. Unfortunately, it couldn’t last forever, and Mei still had to get her hours in for the day. Not that that was a bad thing! Again, she really did like her job, it was just… well, it was work. Necessary, and definitely fun at times, but work all the same.

After she changed into her uniform and checked in with Denis, she noticed Akabayashi was there, who just so happened to be one of her first customers for the day. He was just sitting by himself at a booth seat since the restaurant was pretty empty, but seeing him reminded her of Orihara. And Orihara reminded her of-

Right, her promise to be better.

After bringing him his food, the woman paused, thinking over how to ask. Thankfully, the red-haired man noticed her strange behavior.

“Suzuki-san, do you need something?” he asked, not unkindly. 

She should probably just ask before she started second-guessing herself too much, shouldn't she?

“Yeah. Do you know any good places where I could sign up for self-defense classes, Akabayashi-san?” she asked, a bit nervous. “I’ve been thinking about it lately, that I should probably learn, so…”

Akabayashi let out a light laugh. “Yeah, yeah. It’s no problem. I hear there’s a family-run dojo that’s pretty good. I could give you directions, if you want.” 

The woman nodded, tearing a page out of her notebook for him and passing over her pen. “Thanks, I really appreciate it.”

The red-haired man's lips twitched up into a small smile as he passed the paper and pen back to her after writing down an address. “Don’t worry about it. It’s good that a youngster like you is taking an interest in her own safety.”

“...Thanks?” Mei replied, not quite sure if that was a threat or not. “Oh, I should probably get back to the other customers, so…”

Akabayashi waved her off. “Don’t worry about it. Just tell me if you like it there later.”

The woman went back to her routine, taking orders, serving food, and taking bills until the door loudly slammed shut. She flinched at the sound, turning towards the front of the restaurant to see-

“Damn flea, roaming around Ikebukuro like he owns the place,” Heiwajima growled. Tanaka followed behind him, a bit sheepish. “Where’s Simon?”

“Not here,” Denis said, glancing over at them from the sushi bar. “He went home since Mei was scheduled for the day. Speaking of, are you here for food or not?”

Heiwajima scowled. “Fine, if we’re here already.” He walked up to the sushi bar to take a seat but stopped when he saw the older man's expression.

Denis shifted the knife in his hand as he cut up a roll of sushi. “Take a room today, you’re scaring the other customers.” 

The blond’s scowl grew deeper. “Fine, fine…”

Tanaka turned to Mei, mouthing an apology as he followed Heiwajima to one of the back rooms. No one else was using them at the moment, so whichever one they picked would be fine.

“I can go back and take their orders, Mei. Don’t worry about it,” Denis said once the duo shut the door behind them. 

The woman shook her head. Even if Heiwajima was intimidating at times, she knew he wasn't a bad person. “It’s fine, I’m a waitress. That’s my job. I’ll just… be professional, as always.” 

Denis raised an eyebrow. “If you’re sure. If it’s too much, I can always deliver their food instead.”

Mei thought she’d be fine; however, she did decide to give them a minute or two to settle in before taking their orders. It’d be… a little smoother that way. Hopefully. In the meantime, she delivered another round of drinks to a couple in a booth seat, but-

“It’s not much of a surprise that he’s in such a foul mood,” a nearby customer muttered. “Even if he did hit that info broker with a trash can.”

“More people are wanderin' around wearing yellow too,” another added. “It could be those Yellow Scarves guys comin' back.”

Mei blinked. Holy shit. She missed seeing the Izaya trash can gif in real life? That was a crime. An absolute  _ crime _ . 

Ah, and foreshadowing. She didn't realize Kida's (she thought it was his, anyways) gang was a background thing this early on.

But damn, that means she missed the cell phone smashing scene too. That was so iconic-

Shit, that was the problem. She really had to stop finding Orihara’s antics, on screen or not, entertaining. It was a legitimate threat to her health and safety at this point.

The woman shook off those thoughts quickly, giving a smile to the couple before heading back to take Heiwajima and Tanaka’s orders. She could think about Orihara later, but she was at work right now and had far more important things to worry about. Like doing her job, for instance. After a beat, she worked up her confidence and knocked on the door.

“Denis?” Heiwajima asked.

“No, it's Suzuki. Can I take your orders?”

Tanaka spoke up. “Yeah, that'd be great. Thanks!”

Restraining a sigh, the woman opened the door as casually as she could, notebook in hand. “What would you two like today?”

Tanaka rambled off his order while Heiwajima gave his in a clipped tone. They knew what they wanted right away as they were both regulars. She paused for a second after clipping her pen on the notebook, about to ask a question but deciding against it. Instead, she left the room to pass along the orders. 

She continued bringing food to and taking orders from the other customers, but the duo's food ended up done fairly quickly.

“You sure you want to bring that back?” Denis asked, eyeing the platter he just passed to the brunette. 

Mei gave a halfhearted shrug. “Yeah, it's fine.”

After all, it wasn't like she wasn't unused to tiptoeing around angry people. Heiwajima may have super strength, but she'd take a broken bone over aggressive derisions against her sense of self-worth any day. Not that she'd ever broken a bone before (wait, that was a really poor comparison then-), but the point still stood. Kinda.

Mei bit the inside of her lip, contemplating her life for a second before brushing it off and knocking on the door to the duo's room. Honestly? She wasn't even that scared of Heiwajima; his anger just brought up bad memories.

She delivered the food and went back to the cycle: more orders, more food, collecting some bills here and there. It was all fairly straightforward. She didn't bother making small talk with Tanaka or Heiwajima while delivering food, as Heiwajima still looked irritated, but when she went to give them the bill after a half hour or so-

Well, he didn't look angry anymore. Just a bit tired, really, which was relatable. 

After handing off the bill (Tanaka offered to pay for both of them, and Heiwajima protested but eventually gave in), Mei turned to Heiwajima.

“You're… okay, right?”

He sighed loudly. “Yeah, everything's just been annoying lately. Sorry you had to deal with that.”

“It's not a problem,” she replied. “We all get angry sometimes. I usually find it helpful to talk to friends about it though.”

“Oh yeah?” He didn't seem annoyed, just politely interested.

“Yeah. I… used to talk to my roommate about it,” the woman added, staring at the wall for a moment.

“Used to?” Tanaka asked.

Mei shrugged. “We live in different cities now.” 

Well, that was technically true, but said roommate was also in another world and time. The woman briefly wondered how her friend was doing before pushing the thought away. She had to stay focused on her work.

Tanaka hummed before passing the bill back with some cash. She gave them a quick wave before returning to Denis, and as she closed the door behind her, she heard Heiwajima say-

“Friends, huh?”

* * *

The woman was on her way home from the dojo Akabayashi had recommended. Since she was back to working afternoon and night shifts, she went to check the place out the next morning and had brought a T-shirt and sweatpants along in her backpack (just in case she started that day) in addition to her work uniform. It was lucky that she did since after talking to a red-haired woman clad in white and gold, she'd been admitted to a free trial class at the beginner level. 

The workout wasn't too hard to follow, even if she did lag behind with some of the conditioning exercises. The woman had taken karate back in elementary school, so even if this was a different style, the idea was vaguely familiar to her. The instructors were good teachers too (and had quick eyes for correcting stances and whatnot), so Mei felt that she'd be in good hands.

And thankfully, the place took payment in cash. 

As she walked back to her apartment, her mind wandered back to those classes she took so many years ago. She fondly remembered walking home with her dad during cool summer nights; he'd point out different constellations, and she would look up with wide, eager eyes-

“Yo, Suzuki-chan!”

Goddammit, it was Orihara again.

Mei fought back a sigh. She should probably reply, shouldn't she? “Hello. What a coincidence.”

...That didn't mean she'd be entirely polite about it though. Even if she hid it well, she  _ was  _ rather tired from that workout.  Besides, after last time, it didn't particularly matter what he thought of her personality. She was free to be more abrasive than she was normally, and hopefully, that would drive him away.

“It is, isn't it?” Orihara chirped, jogging to catch up to her. “Although I  _ have _ been looking for you. Who knew you'd be such a difficult woman to find, Suzuki-chan?”

Good, that meant he hadn't found her apartment. Mei didn’t want him to know where she lived, so she’d just have to go directly to work instead of swinging by there like she originally planned. She was lucky that she’d brought her uniform. 

“Do you have a specific question or something? If so, it's not like there are many witnesses around here anyways,” she joked, gesturing around at the vacant neighborhood streets. It was a little past noon, and most people who would’ve been walking around there were either at work or school.

Orihara tapped his chin, briefly looking skywards. “I do, actually. This is normally something that requires discretion, but I'll just come out and say it; Suzuki-chan, why didn’t you report me to the police?”

The woman’s steps faltered, and she stopped. She… really didn’t expect  _ that  _ question, of all things. 

After walking past her, Orihara spun around, hands in his coat pockets. His eyes scanned over her, assessing. “It really is curious. As, how did you put it, ‘just an ordinary waitress,’” he said, putting air quotes around the last four words, “you should’ve told someone about it. Denis and Simon, at least, if not the police. But you didn’t. You didn’t tell anyone.”

The woman kept her expression carefully neutral. “No, I didn’t.”

“But  _ why _ ?” he stressed, circling her. “It’s perfectly normal human behavior to do so, especially after what some would consider traumatizing, as you ever-so-kindly said our little adventure was last time. No, you could be doing this for one of two reasons: either you’re the type of person who doesn’t like talking about your problems, or you’re hiding something.”

Ah, shit. She shouldn’t have let him keep talking. 

“You got me,” Mei admitted, forcing amusement onto her face. “Reason one. Besides, snitches get stitches and all that.”

It was true, to some extent. She didn’t like bothering others with her problems unless she really, truly trusted them. She had information like that used against her in the past, and it hurt. She also had people ignore her entirely, as she tended to ramble (it was her parents, and they had  _ asked _ -), and that hurt too. For both cases, she’d been told to just grow thicker skin.

Orihara let out a short laugh. “True, but I somehow doubt that was your  _ complete _ reasoning. As I said, you’re a rather difficult woman to track down. I’d almost be tempted to say you lack a paper trail if your name wasn’t so common.”

Fuck, this was getting at exactly what she was trying to avoid!

“As you said, Suzuki Mei is a dreadfully common name,” the woman said airily, firmly keeping her true emotions in check, “for an equally common girl. For a city where the supernatural bleeds into the mundane, there’s a lot more interesting things to check up on anyways.”

Now, to hope that he takes the bait-

“I suppose so,” Orihara replied, though the amusement in his expression said he knew what she was doing. Shit- “Though I wonder, what do you think are the biggest things happening in this city, Suzuki-chan? Supernatural or not.”

To Mei, the answers were fairly obvious. Hell, they could all be explained by things she’d overheard, so-

“The Dollars, the Yellow Scarves, and the Slasher,” she responded. “At least for now; I’d imagine it could change rather quickly.”

Orihara hummed. “True, true. I’d like some reasoning though, and I won’t let you get out of it this time.”

“And what are you gonna do if I don’t explain? Follow me around constantly?” she said, tone dripping with sarcasm. After all, he had much better things to do than-

“I'm not opposed to that suggestion,” he chirped, and Mei fought back a scowl. Admittedly, Orihara didn't have any qualms about bothering people who wanted to be left alone, so this shouldn’t have been too surprising. She should’ve just kept her mouth shut. Regardless, it was probably safer just to humor him.

“Everyone’s talking about the Dollars, first of all,” she began, collecting her thoughts. “It’s almost impossible to avoid hearing about them. They don’t seem to have any rhyme or reason to who’s in it or not, though some people are certainly more vocal about it than others. From what I can gather, they seem like a microcosm of this city and a good place to go for gossip. But those louder groups could certainly cause trouble and probably will, with how the group’s reputation as a whole is being presented to the public.”

Orihara nodded, encouraging her to continue.

“The Yellow Scarves used to be a bigger name, but…” she trailed off. The woman didn’t really remember much about them from the show, and the rumors weren’t exactly forthcoming either. She’d have to improvise. “I suppose that just shows how transient things can be in this city with what people consider to be power. It seems like they’re trying to make a comeback, and with that louder group in the Dollars, there could be a conflict there.” At this point, Mei was just guessing at things based off of basic storytelling principles. Orihara seemed to like it though.

“Go on, go on! What about the Slasher?” he asked eagerly, edging towards her.

His reaction was a bit concerning, but- “The Slasher? They’re an extra variable thrown into the equation, and since the attacks only just started up, there’s not really much I can say on them. I don’t think it’s all done by the same person though, as some of the times and locations between attacks don’t really match up. They’re certainly becoming more popular, so if they keep this up… well, it could become an issue.”

“A bit lacking on the end there, but serviceable enough, I suppose,” Orihara critiqued, an expression of something she couldn’t quite place in his eyes. Slowly, his face split into a wide grin. “That settles it! Suzuki-chan, do you want to join the Dollars?”

Mei blinked. He… could do that? Just invite people to join a super-secret website-gang hybrid on a whim?

...Wait, that was a plot point-

“I guess?” she replied. Maybe he’d stick to bothering her there instead of in person. And besides, it  _ would  _ be a really good way to gather information about what was going on in the city. Hell, it might help her get home (even if it was a plot thing).

“You guess? Suzuki-chan, what a lackluster response,” Orihara chided, doing a little spin. “Some people would kill for a chance at this! As you said, it’s one of Ikebukuro’s hottest topics.”

“...Please don’t say ‘hottest topics’ ever again.”

Orihara gasped, placing his hand over his heart in mock hurt. “Whyever not? It’s a perfectly functional phrase. Although, if it bothers me that much… give me your cell phone number so I can send you what you need to get into the Dollars site, and I’ll never say it again.”

Unfortunately, Mei didn’t have a working cell phone.

“Really?” she said, raising an eyebrow.

She also didn’t believe him.

“Well, if you’re going to be like that-”

“I don’t have a phone,” Mei interrupted, not really wanting to deal with much more of his antics today. 

Orihara stopped, confusion flitting across his face. “You… don’t have a cell phone,” he repeated in disbelief.

She shrugged. “Nope.”

“Your sense of humor is heavily influenced by internet culture, and you don’t have a cell phone.” He still didn’t seem to believe her.

“Computers exist, you know.”

Orihara sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Email, then?” 

Mei nodded, and he passed her his phone. Like all the other devices she’d seen in this place, it was incredibly out of date from what she was used to; however, it also seemed like it was one of the newer models of the time. She hastily put in the email she’d created to sign up for various accounts here (mostly on forums in an attempt to find a way home) in the blank contact he’d opened up and passed it back. He could put whatever he wanted for her contact name; she really didn’t care.

“If you look at it a certain way, it is sort of amazing you knew that much about the city without a cell phone,” Orihara mused, twirling around before following Mei as she started walking again. “If you had one, who knows what sort of interesting conclusions you might concoct!” He leaned in over her shoulder, smiling widely.

“...Probably the same ones. It’s not like I don’t ever go on the internet,” Mei drawled, although she had to admit her time online had been severely limited since she stepped off that time-traveling bus. Not that she’d tell Orihara that. She also firmly ignored how he was encroaching on her personal space.

“You  _ would _ be more informed though, since you’d have easier access, which could be interesting,” he said, drawing back. “Maybe… well, for now, I hope the Dollars will be satisfying enough.”

Mei’s eyebrows knit together in confusion. She barely used social media in the first place, and she mostly just lurked when she did. Nowadays, she only posted if she thought it could help her gain more information on a lead to getting back home, and even then, she never attached her name to anything. 

“Why wouldn’t it be?” she asked, genuinely curious, but Orihara was lost in thought and didn’t seem to hear her. He was humming and hawing, probably planning… something. Whatever it was, she probably shouldn’t leave him like that for too long.

“Orihara-san,” Mei called, but he didn’t notice. “Orihara-san!” She was a little louder this time, and he looked over at her.

“Yes?”

...Shit, she forgot what she was going to say. What should she-

Abruptly, Orihara’s phone went off. Mei was very, very grateful.

He pulled it out of his pocket, his lips twitching upwards. 

“I suppose this is the end of our time together for now. It was fun as always, Suzuki-chan,” he said cheerfully, skipping away and giving her a wave. “I’ll have to stop by again sometime. Maybe we could even go on another adventure someday! See you.”

And with that, Orihara spun down another street and out of her sight.

Dammit. If Orihara was going to be sticking around, she really had to stay on top of those self-defense classes. Maybe she should ask someone at the dojo about conditioning routines that she could do on her own?

At the very least, adding in some running wouldn't hurt.

...Wait, she was supposed to run away whenever she saw him.  _ Shit- _

* * *

It was a fairly slow afternoon at work, so she was just wiping down tables and idly chatting with Simon and Denis about the weather. It was rather nice, and it reminded her of some of the good memories she had of her old job. The conversation shifted, and Simon and Denis were talking about the snow back in Russia with Mei just nodding along when the door chimed. Heiwajima was here now, apparently.

Thankfully, he seemed to be in a lot better mood than last time. 

“Hey, Simon. Denis. Suzuki-san,” he greeted.

“Are you here for sushi, Shizuo?” Simon asked.

“Nah, not today. Just wanted to thank Suzuki-san for the good advice,” Heiwajima said, nodding in her direction.

Mei blinked. “Ah… you're welcome?”

Wait, what was he-

“I talked to a friend about it, so thanks.”

Ah, that.

“I gotta get going. See you around,” Heiwajima said, giving her a small wave as he walked away.

“Yeah, see you later,” Mei replied, hiding her confusion. 

Man, that was a really short conversation.

Shrugging it off, the woman went back to wiping down tables. She didn’t particularly think she deserved any gratitude for it, as it really was just normal advice, but she’d take what she could get. Hell, it was one more step towards being a better person, right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There were a few small, interesting details that snuck their way in this chapter. I don't know if anyone caught this, but Mei is very straight to the point when she takes Shizuo and Tom's orders. There's a reason for this - she's purposefully adapting her behavior to try to make this encounter short and not make Shizuo angrier. I debated addressing it in-text, but since it's normal for her, I decided against it. Also, the scene with Shizuo at the end is meant to show that Mei can unintentionally impact the plot (i.e., the conversation Shizuo is referring to, which is between him and Celty, moved up from episode 7 to just after episode 3).
> 
> Thanks again for reading, and have a great week!


	8. The Do-Something Dollars

As Mei checked into work, she couldn’t help but note how busy it was. She knew there was a special going on, so it wasn’t particularly unexpected, but she knew she’d have to be careful to stay on top of everything. She was up to the challenge though, pasting her best customer service smile on as she left the back room. Thankfully, the woman was well-rested since today was a day off from the self-defense classes, even if she was a little sore.

As it got dark out, more and more people filtered into the restaurant. Someone mentioned the Dollars in passing, and it led to her mind wandering a bit as she picked up the next batch of food to be delivered. She’d been checking the site whenever she went to the library, and it was really interesting. She remembered poking the fan site once in high school, but she’d never seen a bulletin board style website otherwise. It was kind of neat, like a relic of the forgotten ages. She’d been seeing a lot of old-style websites recently, and it never failed to be weirdly nostalgic for her even though she never browsed the internet much back in her 2010. She found her username rather funny too, even if it was a little on the long side.

The site was a wealth of information, and some threads (or boards, technically) were dedicated to urban legends in the city. It was amusing to see what people thought of the headless rider in particular as some of the stories posted were pretty outrageous, but there was also a thread about the city’s underground and particular individuals to avoid. Some of those, like Heiwajima, had coverage in the urban legends section too, but others, like Orihara and the Awakusu Kai? Not so much. 

Hell, one user - who specifically reminded her of Erika for some reason - was talking about maybe writing some fanfics in those threads. The woman was morbidly curious to see if it’d go anywhere (hell, if it really  _ was  _ Erika, it probably would, and that would be a good thing).

Speaking of which, she was fairly certain that the van squad was in the Dollars. Maybe she should talk to them about it? Or-

Ah, more customers. This time, they happened to be people she knew, albeit peripherally. Mikado (damn, it should be Ryuugamine to her; she kept messing up with his name, for whatever reason) and Kida showed up with a girl in tow. Mei greeted them with a smile on her face. Their classmate introduced herself as Sonohara Anri, and although Mei recognized the name, she didn't let anything show. She assumed that the girl was the last member of the teen trio. Since they were seated at the sushi bar, Denis had them covered, so Mei went back to looking after the other customers. Abruptly, the door chimed, and then- 

“Hey, Mei-chan!” Erika called as she entered the restaurant, the rest of the van squad trailing behind her.

The waitress turned towards the door, smiling to greet them. “Hey, guys. How are you all doing?”

“Good, we're just grabbing some food before visiting a friend,” Kyouhei responded. “Actually, we should introduce you to them sometime, if you're up for it.”

“Sure, sounds fun,” she replied. “Where do you want to sit?”

The van squad claimed one of the back rooms after briefly saying hello to the high school trio and quickly gave their orders. Mei gave them a wave before going back to check in on the other customers; however, when she dropped off the next few pages from her notebook, Simon suggested that Mei take a break and chat with the group until their food was ready. Denis agreed, so once they were all settled, the woman just decided to come out and say it.

“So, are you guys in the Dollars?”

The van squad certainly didn't expect  _ that  _ question. Kyouhei raised an eyebrow while the rest of the group started denying it all at once.

“What, no-” Walker exclaimed.

“Why would you think-” Erika began.

Saburo coughed. “I don't-”

“I mean, I am,” Mei interrupted their exclamations, fidgeting with her hands. If she was wrong- “Not that it matters or anything; I was just curious.”

The three grew silent, and Kyouhei let out a long sigh. “Yeah, we are.”

Well, it was a good thing she wasn't.

“Dotachin!” Erika protested. 

“What? We hang out with her all the time, and it's not like she's lyin' or anything,” he justified.

Walked gestured around them. “Yeah, but this isn't something you talk about in the open! It's like some super secret rebellion-”

“‘In the open,’” Saburo repeated, raising an eyebrow. “We're in the back of a sushi shop. We're fine.”

“The real question is are you ready to sell your soul to the demon butler that runs the site,” Erika interrupted exaggeratedly, wiggling her fingers at Mei for emphasis.

The woman let out a light laugh. “I just browse, really. The site has more positives than negatives, and the community as a whole is really nice too.”

“Yeah, that’s one of the best parts,” Saburo added. “It’s good to talk to others with similar interests and all that.” Erika and Walker agreed enthusiastically.

“It can also be practical,” Mei continued, bringing a hand to her chin in thought. “A big site like the Dollars, all centered here in Ikebukuro, can be used to help. Like… organizing people to look for a lost wallet or something.”

She was pretty sure she’d seen a few of those threads floating around, right?

“Or a plate!” Walker added, and Mei just shrugged. She was… a little confused about that comment, but whatever.

“No, the plate’s broken, not lost,” Erika corrected before turning back to Mei. “So, what's your username? I wanna keep an eye out for you, now that I know you're a part of it too.” Walker nodded in agreement.

“Well-”

Ah, it was nice to have friends.

* * *

Unfortunately, they couldn't chat for long. The van squad’s food came out quickly, as Denis was trying to stay on top of things with the rush, and Mei had to go back to work. She continued serving customers, and when it became time for the van squad to leave with some additional takeout they ordered, she gave them a quick smile and a wave. Mei wasn't the only friend the van squad was going to see today, however, which led them to-

“Kazutano, we brought you some sushi!” Erika called as they walked into the old building.

“Hey!” Saburo greeted. “And we brought you a plate from Russia Sushi too.”

As the group walked up the stairs and onto the floor where their friend Kazutano lived, they noted with dread that the often busy building was near empty. It was unsettling, and when Walker turned the corner to their friend's room-

“Ah, what the hell!” he exclaimed. The room was wrecked. Furniture was tipped over, and decorations were smashed to pieces. Kyouhei, Erika, and Saburo trailed in behind him. “So I'm guessing ‘I broke a plate’ isn't what he really meant to tell us.”

Kyouhei agreed, taking in the sight with grim severity, but-

“It was a bowl!” the blond added, holding said object up. The majority of the group politely ignored that comment.

“Dotachin,” Erika called, bringing the group's attention to her. She held up a book and read off the title. “‘Simple Kanji converter.’”

As she examined the object closer, Kyouhei sighed. “What has he done now?”

Saburo dropped something, sinking down to the floor. “He must've been kidnapped by those lowlifes that traffic humans. We'll never see him again,” he said, despair leaking into his voice. He put his head in his hand. “How the hell am I supposed to get by without Kazutano around? How can I live without him?!”

Kyouhei bent down, placing a hand on Saburo's shoulder in support. “If he was kidnapped when that email came, then it wasn't that long ago. We're gonna find him before they drop him off, I promise you. And then we'll bring him back.”

“But how?”

“I know,” a kid cut in from the room's entryway. “I hid, but I saw the car they drive.”

“Hasim!” Erika exclaimed.

“You're it!” Walker added. “You're the ultimate little-brother type helper-fairy character.”

* * *

After the group talked a bit more and walked back to their vehicle, Kyouhei ended up calling an old friend to get an extra eye out for the black van that the kidnappers drove. They gave the takeout originally meant for Kazutano to Kasim as thanks, and as they drove away-

“Hey, why don't we put something up on the Dollars boards?” Erika suggested. 

“Oh yeah!” Walker agreed, clapping his hands together. “Like Mei-san mentioned earlier!”

After a beat, Kyouhei nodded. “Sure, it can't hurt.”

* * *

Back at Russia Sushi, it was getting ridiculously busy. The trio had left shortly after the van squad, but so many other people piled in after that Mei was struggling to keep up. It was probably the busiest it had ever been since she was hired. 

The woman picked up a few more platters from Denis, balancing them carefully as she flittered around the restaurant, dropping them off as needed. She asked a few tables if they needed anything before spinning around to go back to the sushi bar-

Wait, was that Orihara?

It was. He and his fluffy coat had just sauntered in, and he was making a beeline for Denis at the counter. Maybe he was ordering takeout? Well, it didn't concern Mei if he was. Takeout orders weren't one of her responsibilities around the restaurant. 

...Wait, last time he said he was going to bother her again - this could be bad.

Unfortunately, she couldn't exactly run away from him at work (which was her original plan, if she could ever actually remember it in a useful situation!). If he was just grabbing some food to-go, then it'd be all the more convenient for her-

Ah, he was. She could barely hear, but she could catch enough of his conversation with Denis to tell Orihara wanted to take the food with him. Cool.

Putting that train of thought squarely away, Mei turned back to another set of customers. She needed to make rounds and check in with a few more tables before picking up some more food. She could… attempt to ignore him, for now.

However, as Mei walked between tables, she couldn't keep herself from shooting furtive glances at Orihara. He hadn't been there long, but he was already growing impatient, tapping his foot and pawing at his cell phone. After she finished her rounds and couldn't reasonably hold back from going up to the sushi bar anymore, the woman struggled with a question nipping at the back of her mind.

Should she… talk to him?

Obviously that seemed like a bad idea, but hear her out!

She was at work, and she had to walk over there anyways, so she couldn't just ignore him. Besides, it was polite to greet people if you knew them, right? Maybe? Wait, how well do you have to know a person before you greet them in passing? The woman had always been awkward about stuff like that, not quite knowing if and when she should say hello to acquaintances on the streets-

Oh, she was at the bar already. 

Mei blinked passively at Orihara as Denis went to grab the platters. He was too absorbed in his phone to notice her. She second-guessed herself one last time before giving in.

“Hi, Orihara-san.”

He looked up at her, startled, almost dropping his phone as he tried to shove it back into his pocket. Denis handed off the platters to Mei, and she spun around to leave.

“Bye, Orihara-san.”

“...Bye?” he echoed, tilting his head to the side as she glanced back.

Mei sighed, resisting the urge to scowl as she walked to her next table. That interaction was somehow even more awkward than if she just hadn't said anything at all; she should've kept her mouth shut. Thankfully, after she dropped the first platter off, she noticed Denis handing off some takeout to Orihara who then rapidly bounced out of the restaurant. 

Good. She didn't have to deal with her embarrassment for very long, then. 

The woman turned her attention to her next customers, putting on her brightest customer service smile. It was back to work for her, no distractions this time.

* * *

The van squad, on the other hand, had been looking around in-person for their friend, asking people on the street - and even a stray dog - for directions while occasionally checking the site to see if there were any relevant replies. Most were general messages wishing them good luck, and a few others expressed that something similar had happened with someone they knew before, but then-

“Someone saw it!” Walker exclaimed.

“We got an address?” Kyouhei asked, eagerness edging into his tone.

“Yeah, it's-” 

As soon as the blond rattled it off, Saburo floored it.

* * *

“Well, this is the place,” Kyouhei said, glancing around. They were outside of a parking garage in south Ikebukuro. Unfortunately, it seemed like the black van the kidnappers drove was long gone. Just another dead end.

“You know, I was thinking,” Erika started, “why don't we call his cell phone? He might still have it on him.”

“Yeah, and if we can reach him, maybe we can negotiate with the kidnappers,” Walker added. 

Kyouhei immediately pulled out his phone to make the call, the rest of the group leaning towards him to hear, but then-

“Wait, do you guys hear that?” Saburo asked, looking around frantically. Another phone was ringing somewhere nearby.

“Hey, is that Izaya-kun over there?” Erika asked, gesturing across the street. It was, and the black-haired man bent over to grab a ringing phone from a pile of trash bags. Said bags seemed to be misshapen, but the van squad couldn't really see them well from their angle. Orihara answered the phone, and-

“Sushi love! Especially fatty tuna,” he sang, and surprisingly enough, the same phrase could be heard over Kyouhei's phone.

“What the hell?” Kyouhei muttered.

“Oh, it's you, Dotachin,” Orihara replied, turning towards the van squad and waving at them. He kept the phone on and continued talking. “I was just walking and came across this guy sleeping. When his phone rang, I answered it.”

He started skipping towards them, and Kyouhei hung up the phone, asking why he was in the city to begin with.

“Because Russia Sushi's got a special today,” Orihara replied, shouting a bit to cover the distance. He was completely unperturbed by the child-sized elephant slide that was launched at him.

“Izaya!” Heiwajima bellowed from down the street. “Stay the hell out of Ikebukuro!”

Said blond ran at Orihara, shouting incomprehensibly. Closing the phone, Orihara merely tossed it back where he found it. 

“Well, it seems Shizu-chan has found me. See you!” He gave a quick wave to the group before bolting, Heiwajima trailing after him.

“Izaya!”

The two ran down the street and out of sight. The van squad was silent for a long moment.

“...They're totally in love,” Erika said, nodding firmly. 

Walker sputtered. “What, no-”

“We should look for the guy where Orihara-san was standing,” Saburo said, ignoring Erika and walking over to where the elephant slide had ripped up the street. Kyouhei followed. 

Once they made it over there, Saburo grabbed the presumed kidnapper by his pink hoodie. The guy was asleep, so he resorted to shaking him repeatedly. 

“Wake up! Wake up, dammit!” Saburo growled. “Hey, wake up! C'mon!”

Kyouhei seemed fine with just watching his friend until Erika and Walker pulled certain…  _ tools _ out of their bags. 

“Hey, put those away! You'll put 'im to sleep for good,” Kyouhei exclaimed.

“But the longer we wait to find Kazutano…” Erika began.

“She's right! The longer we wait means the closer they get to killing him!” Walker interrupted.

Kyouhei hummed in consideration before grabbing pink hoodie guy's feet and shaking him upside down. Change and a cell phone - not Kazutano's - clattered out from his pockets. Kyouhei crouched down to pick up said device.

“So what's the plan?” Walker asked, leaning over. 

“I'm gonna have his buddies tell us exactly where that drop off place is.”

* * *

The rest was history. Kyouhei impersonated pink and got the address. When the van squad got there, the headless rider showed up shortly afterwards. Panicking, the kidnappers let Kazutano go and hit the gas. They were  _ really  _ terrified of Celty for some reason. The van squad and Kazutano piled into the van as fast as they could, and they were off. 

They did eventually catch one of the kidnappers. Saburo sat with said kidnapper in the trunk of the van, glaring at him, while Erika and Walker were perched in the back seats.

“Yo, time for you to cough up where it is you're droppin' off your goods,” Saburo said, gaze intense.

The kidnapper remained quiet, petulantly crossing his arms.

“Aw, come on,” Walker complained. “It's no fun at all if you don't get to torture them a little first. Here, you can pick any of these books you want.”

Erika dropped a stack of manga down next to Saburo and the kidnapper in the back of the van. “And then we'll torture you the way they do in the book.”

“Guys, you can have your fun, but no gasoline in the car this time, okay?” Saburo stressed.

The kidnapper yelped. “Gaso-”

Needless to say, he talked. However, on the Dollars board, the van squad left out just who or what was experimenting on humans. It was a bit difficult to believe, so they kept their post as a general thank you message informing everyone that they got their friend back.

* * *

This thread, coincidentally, was what informed Mei about the whole debacle. The next morning, she was checking the site as usual, poking around to find any information that could help her get home, and-

“...Wait, wasn't that Yagiri Pharma?” Mei muttered after recognizing her friends' usernames, briefly cursing herself internally as the words slipped past her lips. She furtively glanced around her, and thankfully, the library was pretty empty. 

Her friends seemed fine from the update at the end, and they did rescue their friend who got kidnapped, so that was good. However, the real question for Mei was if she should ask them about it the next time they met up. 

It  _ would  _ be good to know if Yagiri Pharmaceuticals was doing human experimentation. One of the forums she visited had a whole list of complaints about the company from a supposed ‘disgruntled employee,’ and that thread definitely mentioned the whole human experimentation thing (it spent quite a lot of time complaining about that, actually, but more about the inefficiency of how they were doing it rather than the actual practice). The list also seemed to be the most oddly specific out of all the rumors she’d found. If she could confirm it, then she could assume that the rest of their claims might have a grain of truth to them, which… well, a failed time travel experiment was listed. There was a ton of other vaguely sci-fi and supernatural stuff on there too, but that one was the most relevant to her. 

Weirdly enough, they didn’t mention Celty’s head in any way (if the list did, she could’ve just assumed it was fine and went from there), but they did go over some of the main methods they got people for their experiments. Supposedly, one of the groups that supplied them was a trio of men: one with glasses, one in a pink hoodie, and one in a purple jacket. Glasses and pink were familiar to the woman from her misadventure with Orihara, and they were most certainly kidnappers, but she didn’t know if they were connected to the company or not. 

If she could ask the van squad what the kidnappers wore and who they worked for…

Well, she might finally have a solid lead to investigate in her quest to get home. Could that time travel experiment help her out? From her experience, she assumed things worked in a multiverse of some sort, so maybe that's why it failed to begin with? Hell, had they made any progress on it, or was any data they collected entirely useless? It was a  _ failed  _ experiment, and the post was dated from before she even got here so-

Mei cut herself off. It was a long shot to begin with, and she shouldn't waste time speculating when she didn't know if it was reliable in the first place. She had to ask her friends and hope for the best, but was there really any way she could bring that up in a normal conversation? Like, what was she supposed to say? Somehow ‘sorry you had to chase down some kidnappers who caught your friend; by the way, who did they work for and what did they look like?’ seemed a bit insensitive.

It… it was important to her though, and the van squad always encouraged her to talk to them if she needed help-

Right, if she needed help.

If she asked them about it, she needed to have a reason. Well, she did, but was ‘I accidentally time-traveled on my way to class, oops’ a believable one? No, no it wasn’t. Admittedly, she could always say she’d like to know for personal reasons and leave it at that. It wasn’t ideal, but she didn’t have much of a choice. Other than coming clean with them, that is.

The woman’s mind wandered. Would telling them really be so bad? 

Of course, if she did ever decide to tell them, she should probably leave out the whole ‘oh yeah, this is also an anime I saw back in high school’ thing. Just the time travel, which was difficult enough to believe on its own. Would trusting people again-

No, that was a bad idea. Doing so almost always ended badly for her. It… hurt more, from people she cared about (oh, and she had to admit that she  _ did  _ care about the van squad). The hot sting of betrayal, that is. Lies, rejection, insults-

She… wouldn’t tell them for now. The woman would keep it to personal reasons and refuse to elaborate. And if she did decide to tell them someday, well…

Hopefully, they’d stay friends. Even if they didn’t believe her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t particularly like how I did the POV split here, nor how a good portion of this chapter was canon recap with minor changes (the title is a bit iffy too, actually), but it is what it is. Signs of improvement, right? The non-canon parts are still fun though, thankfully. Plot-wise, things are starting to pick up a tad on Mei’s end, which will be… a time, moving forwards. Especially once we get to the conclusion of this arc (I’m really looking forward to that). Fortunately, chapter 9 is definitely interesting, so next time should be a bit better.
> 
> Thanks again for reading, and have a great week!


	9. Confirming Connections

The woman was a bit melancholy after leaving the library, dragging her feet a bit on her way to the dojo for her morning class. Her black leather jacket sat heavy over her shoulders like a blanket of reassurance. She… she could do this. She had to. Just one step at a time, and it’d all work itself out. Well, maybe. Probably.

She shifted, tugging on the straps of her backpack. Yeah, it’d be fine. 

Thinking about the past could be a bit disheartening nowadays with the distance between her and the people she remembered. Maybe she should get something to treat herself? As a distraction? She  _ was  _ accumulating a decent amount of cash, as she’d never been that much of a spender, so maybe she should buy some manga or something? 

Manga could work, maybe she could get-

Wait, she recognized that coat. Oh no, not this time!

The brunette quickly assessed her surroundings for a point of escape. She was on one of the busier streets of a residential neighborhood, and Orihara was a ways ahead of her, twirling around a street light and looking at his phone. There were some people around - gardening, jogging, or walking their dog, mainly - but not many. Thankfully, there were a few side streets she could cut down. The one right in front of her seemed somewhat familiar, ironically due to her previous misadventure with Orihara (maybe him taking her down all those random, winding streets that one night could actually be useful to her?).

She slid down the street as casually as she could, breaking into a brisker pace once she turned the corner. She didn’t want to outright run (too much noise), but she didn’t want him to catch up either. She didn’t dare look behind her, but it felt like someone was following-

“Oh, Suzuki-chan!” a familiar voice called, sickeningly sweet. 

Goddammit. Mei glanced over her shoulder, a knee-jerk reaction to said familiar voice, and saw him waving at her enthusiastically. Shit, she shouldn’t have looked back; she could’ve pretended she didn’t hear him otherwise (didn’t she hate when people did that to her though, and was it really fair to assume he was up to something sinister all the time?).

“...Hey, Orihara-san,” Mei said, slowing to a stop as he jogged to catch up to her. “What’s up?”

Not that she was interested; she really wasn’t.

“Oh, nothing much,” he mused. “It's rather fortunate I ran into you - we had to cut our discussion a bit short last time.”

Mei raised an eyebrow. “‘Fortunate,’” she repeated coolly.

“So cold, Suzuki-chan!” Orihara exclaimed, shrugging with his hands in his coat pockets. “It really is a coincidence; I was just checking out this neighborhood for something else. It's like you think I'm a stalker or something!”

...Wait, that was actually a possibility. He  _ was  _ running into her rather frequently these past few weeks. There was something about a stalker in this show too, right? She thought they were a girl though, so-

“Maybe not intentionally, if I give you the benefit of the doubt,” Mei mumbled. Orihara blinked at her. Shit, she said that out loud; should she try to explain? Yeah, let's go with that- “You're an info broker, right? You exist and you know things; that's your job. For all I know, you could have my schedule memorized.”

That… was actually a terrifying thought. She was rather consistent in what she did. Should she try a new library?

Orihara laughed, waving her off. “No, no - you're not  _ that  _ interesting. I do have some people's routines memorized, but do keep that between us, okay?”

Ah, good - she was safe for now. 

After a pause, Mei nodded in agreement. It was a bit creepy, sure, but it wasn't any of her business. Hell, maybe that was normal in his line of work; she wouldn't know, as the only illegal things she'd ever done before this whole…  _ situation _ were speeding and jaywalking.

“Good, good,” Orihara said, clapping his hands together. “Now, where were we? Right, our previous conversation. Since last time, I looked into you a bit more, just online, really, but when I went fishing around for some legal documents-”

Shit, shit,  _ shit _ . Dammit, she was  _ not  _ safe-

“-I found absolutely nothing!” he continued. “Isn’t it strange, Suzuki-chan, that an info broker like me is having trouble with that? I haven’t gone into much detail yet, true, and you  _ do  _ have a common name, but I should’ve come up with something, right? Since I'm such an excellent info broker?”

Damn, shit, fuck-

They were back to  _ this  _ conversation topic. The one that Mei never wanted to have in the first place. It’s not like she could stop him-

Oh. This was a terrible idea. An absolutely _terrible_ idea, but-

“You know what I think, Suzuki-chan?” Orihara continued, twirling around her in a taunting manner. “I think-”

Anything was better than blackmail. If she could get him to stop like this-

“What, that I don’t use social media?” Mei interrupted. “That’s true. But who said the only way to gather information on a person was online?” She kept her tone leading at the end, as if this were some grand speech and definitely not an improvised disaster.

“No one did, Suzuki-chan,” Orihara admitted, eyes evaluating her with cautious  _ dangerous  _ curiosity-

Again, this was a terrible idea-

“So why don’t we play a game?” Mei suggested. “You don’t look up any more information on me, and I’ll hang out with you more, schedule permitting. Background information might be good and all, but what better way is there to find out how someone really ticks than by poking them in person? It’s probably a lot more fun too.”

...Yeah, willingly spending time with Orihara was probably a bad idea. No, it just  _ was  _ a bad idea. But-

“How is that a game though?” Orihara asked, egging her on. “Who even knows if what you’ll say is the truth? For all I know, you could be an excellent liar.”

Mei wanted to call bullshit on that one. He was an info broker; shouldn’t knowing when someone was lying be a vital skill in that profession?

Admittedly, she didn’t lie outright very often, and for the sake of the game-

“I won’t lie,” she stated, conviction edging into her tone. “At least, not outright. I might avoid questions, and partial truths are fair game, but any conclusions you draw… they’re on you.” 

Orihara’s grin was sharp and his eyes eager. She had him hooked. “Oh, I don’t know if I’d call that a game, Suzuki-chan, but it’s definitely a good incentive.”

Damn, she did  _ not  _ like how he was looking at her-

“Do we have a deal, then?” Mei asked, voice firm.

Like she was just some toy-

“I believe we do.”

Well, shit. She supposed she was spending more time with Orihara now. Good job, Mei. 11/10 persuasion skills, convincing someone you know is actively dangerous to spend time with you in an attempt to avoid blackmail which will probably just result in even  _ more _ blackmail material. Cool, cool. She… really didn’t think this though.

Orihara was still grinning at her like the cat that caught the canary, by the way, which was… disturbing. She should probably say something. Maybe something smart? Or-

“Cool beans,” Mei said, blinking. Or that. Whatever.

In all honesty, she'd been feeling a bit off these past few weeks. She'd been having on-and-off headaches from the stress of… well,  _ everything _ , so silly phrases were, while not ideal, probably fine in the grand scheme of things.

Orihara brought a hand up to his mouth, hiding a small laugh. “You’re a weird human. Entertaining, but weird.”

The woman nodded. Yeah, that wasn’t anything new. 

“Although, if we’re going to spend more time together, we’ll need a way to stay in touch,” he mused, adding a skip to his step as the duo walked down the street. “Do you have a cell phone yet?”

Mei bit back a sigh. “Nope. You  _ do  _ have my email from earlier, so you could always just poke me there.”

She didn’t actually know if she could buy a cell phone or not. That seemed like something you’d need an ID for, right? And she didn’t think she could pay the monthly installments in cash… 

Prepaid phones existed too though, but those probably didn’t have internet. That would kind of suck, since she wanted to stay updated on her search for home more than she wanted to keep in contact with Orihara, but it was still an option.

Orihara pouted. “You  _ still  _ don’t have a cell phone? That’s just plain unnatural, Suzuki-chan! Why, I’d even say it’s stranger than if the headless rider was really headless!”

...Right, she only saw the shadows last time. Not, you know, what the headless rider was named for.

“It is what it is,” Mei said. She wouldn’t say it was  _ that  _ strange, but- “I’ll look into getting one though; it’d probably be useful. Especially for keeping up with the Dollars.”

Orihara nodded resolutely. “Maybe you can be a normal human someday, Suzuki-chan. Cutting out those strange phrases you're fond of might help, but-”

Wow, rude. It wasn’t like he had any room to talk about being normal.

“-they are sort of amusing,” he continued. 

“Weird phrases bring me joy,” Mei confirmed, nodding. She’d been toning it down a bit since she’d been transported here, but she had a lot of strange lines and weird phrases that she enjoyed sprinkling into conversations with close friends or family. For example, ‘it’s not illegal if you don’t get caught’ was always a classic. If Orihara was going to spend copious amounts of time with her (due to the deal which  _ could've been avoided entirely; why are you like this, Mei _ ), she could at least make it fun.

“I must ask, though,” Orihara began, “where, exactly, are we going? I’m more than happy to tag along, but if it’s somewhere boring… well, I  _ do  _ have things I should be doing.”

Shit, she was leading him right to the dojo.

She should’ve stopped walking while they talked or something, dammit. Not… not led him straight to a place where she felt safe. 

At least it wasn’t her apartment. That was one positive about this scenario. That, and the instructors at the dojo could handle themselves (she didn’t want to throw them under the metaphorical bus but-). She might as well be honest for now, to start off their…  _ game  _ on the right foot. Ugh, this sucked.

“I’m going to a dojo for some classes,” Mei admitted. 

“Why?” Orihara asked, feigning polite interest and falling back to trail behind her.

Mei sighed, rolling her shoulders. Well- “When you took me to see that girl get kidnapped, it made me uncomfortable. I don't want to get kidnapped, and I figured I better learn some self-defense.” 

Those were all true statements. Just… together, they skirted around the fact that the possibility of him, specifically, coming back was also a major factor in her decision.

“Good for you, Mei-chan!” Orihara cheered, smiling and clapping his hands together. The duo had just turned a corner, and the dojo could be seen further down the street. “Having healthy coping mechanisms and all that. Well, I gotta bounce!” He then pivoted around, walking back down the street they came down one foot in front of the other with arms swaying.

...Hmm, that was weird. And kind of patronizing. Was he just Like That™? Or was it something else?

Ah, whatever. Mei had to get changed before her class started, and she didn’t want to be late. The Mystery of Orihara could be solved another day (or realistically, probably never).

* * *

Mei was… confused. She looked up how to buy a cell phone the next day, more specifically if she needed an ID or a bank account for it, and she didn’t get any answers? Like, all it said was look for models and good deals ahead of time, which was kind of obvious. There was nothing about what she actually needed, other than presumably money, to get a phone.

As a result, she just did a quick search for reasonably priced phones in the area, figuring that she might as well try talking to some people at the stores. Worst case scenario, she could just say she forgot her ID at home and never go back. After she found one that she liked, she wrote down the directions and went over there with a good chunk of money sequestered in her wallet, keeping it zipped up in the inside pocket of her leather jacket for safety. Once she arrived, she asked the salesman about the model to make sure that the deal she found online was still valid, and then she just… bought it? They didn’t ask her for an ID or anything, and they took cash payments for both the phone and the monthly payment plans (the latter of which she'd have to mail in, but that wasn't that big of a deal).

Whether or not it was legal, it worked out for her so… win? Plus one cell phone to her inventory, yay. The only other thing notable about the whole ordeal was that Mei felt  _ really  _ awkward signing her new name. When the contract was presented to her, she felt herself itching to sign away with her old name in that familiar English cursive. She didn’t, obviously, but she missed it. It ached in a way she didn’t think it would.

She tried to put those feelings aside, though, and focus on the present (or was it the past - time travel was  _ weird _ ). At least this way, Orihara wouldn’t have any reason to bother her about this particular issue. She could also give her number to the van squad when they met up… later today, actually. That’d be good. Maybe they could hang out more spontaneously, then.

...Wait,  _ today _ . She was going to be late, shit-

* * *

She wasn’t late. Out of breath, yes, but not late. Mei ran the entire way from the cell phone store to their meet up point, which was… not a short distance.

It was nice that she could check her new phone to confirm that she wasn’t late. Before, she just had to leave early and hope for the best, mainly because she hated wearing watches for whatever reason. They made her wrist feel uncomfortable.

“Hey, is that a cell phone?” Walker asked, leaning over her shoulder. “I didn’t know you had one.”

Mei noted the unanswered question being why hadn’t she given them her number if she  _ did  _ have one. Thankfully, she had a good explanation for that.

“My old one broke a while back,” she said, pausing to catch her breath. She supposed not functioning correctly due to time travel could count as breaking, especially since it could no longer perform its main functions (i.e.,  _ calling or texting her family _ ). “So I had to buy a new one. Got it today, actually.” 

Hell, she even had the box in her backpack as she didn’t have time to drop it off at home (shit, when did she start thinking of that apartment as home-).

“Nice! Not that your old one broke, of course,” Erika rambled, “but that you got a new one. We should trade numbers!”

Mei smiled at her. “Yeah, sounds great. My number changed, so just let me check what it is first-”

She slid open the new phone (ah, slide phones - those brought back memories) and opened her contacts, bringing up her new number. She showed it to the group, and eventually, she got their phone contact info all squared away. She could now contact the van squad at all hours of the day, nice.

They ended up talking for a while, wandering over to the park and grabbing some ice cream. The whole time, something was nagging at the back of Mei’s mind. It was like she was forgetting-

Ah, right. She had to ask about Yagiri Pharma.

She… didn’t actually know what a good way to go about that was. The conversation was winding down a bit, so now  _ would  _ be a good time to say something. If it would actually be a good something though… Mei took a deep breath and decided to just run with it.

“I saw a thread earlier on the Dollars site about a friend of yours getting kidnapped. I know you said everything was fine, but… are you guys all okay?”

“We rescued him, so it all worked out,” Walker replied. “It was like an adventure right out of a manga!”

“The kidnappers were kind of slimy,” Erika said, “which fits for their character archetype.”

“Kazutano was fine - a bit shaken up, but he's back,” Saburo added. “That's the most important thing.”

Mei nodded along, a tad anxious, and Kyouhei gave her a look.

“There's something else you wanted to know, right?” he asked.

“...Yeah,” Mei began, biting the inside of her lip. Ah, this was so awkward- “I was wondering if you guys ever figured out who they worked for? And what they looked like, if possible.”

“Oh yeah, they-” Walker started, but Kyouhei cut him off.

“Why do you want to know?”

Mei bit back a sigh as the group evaluated her. They weren't outright suspicious of her, but they were being cautious, which she supposed was fair. “If you don't want to tell me that's understandable, but can I just ask a yes or no question?”

After a beat, Kyouhei nodded.

“Was it Yagiri Pharmaceuticals?” she asked. Erika and Walker blinked, a bit startled. Saburo sighed, and Mei could hear a hint of irritation in his tone.

“...Yes, it was,” Kyouhei confirmed neutrally.

Mei hummed. “Thanks, that's… good to know.”

It really was - the descriptions would've helped too, but it was what it was. Unfortunately, the van squad was giving her weird looks now, which wasn't ideal.

“Why was that your first guess?” Erika asked after a moment, leaning towards Mei. 

Walker chimed in, expressing similar sentiments. “Yeah! Are you some sort of paranormal investigator or something?”

Mei really didn't know where the paranormal part came in, but she'd do her best to answer while not giving too much away.

“I was looking into something else, and I came across someone complaining about the company. They specifically mentioned kidnapping and human experiments, so I was wondering if what they said had any truth to it.”

That was… a decent answer. All technically true, but it danced around the core issue (i.e., the whole time travel thing).

Unfortunately, her luck wouldn't last.

“What were you looking into?” Saburo inquired. He seemed mildly interested, but his expression was mostly guarded. And Mei… she couldn't tell them the truth to assuage his concerns, but she didn't want to lie either so-

“Personal reasons,” she said noncommittally. Saburo merely raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. Mei bit her lip again before continuing, her shoulders tensing up. “I… might tell you guys someday.”

That… well, she didn't know if she would. Was it a lie? Who knew. Wait, this wasn't like the conversation with Orihara from earlier; she  _ could  _ lie if she had to, she just didn't want to. Especially since she considered the van squad friends.

“Are you in trouble? We can try to help if you are,” Erika said, concerned. Walker nodded in agreement.

“I… not really?” Mei replied, a bit startled to be put on the spot (even if she shouldn't be; she's the one who started this conversation, after all). Unfortunately, her true, unfiltered emotions were showing; she shouldn't have gotten so comfortable around them. It was fine normally, but in this conversation- “I'm not in any immediate danger if that's what you're asking.”

“But you are in danger,” Kyouhei stated.

They were hesitantly concerned about her, and it made her uncomfortable.

“No,” Mei denied, forcing her expression to a firm neutral. The tension in her back still held, however. “It's just an ongoing issue. Nothing bad will happen if it's left alone.”

“...Right,” Kyouhei said, slight disbelief in his tone. Hell, Mei had no idea what conclusions they could be drawing from this, so she really just had to hope for the best. Maybe she should stop hanging around them so often? But she  _ liked  _ the van squad, and-

“Would knowing what they look like help?” Erika said, interrupting the awkward silence. “I mean, you did ask about that so-”

“Oh yeah! Is it information that'll help further your quest?” Walker chimed in.

“It is,” Mei agreed. Kyouhei and Saburo glanced at each other.

Kyouhei sighed. “Just promise us that you'll say something if it does become dangerous, okay? I'm fine with tellin' you, but…”

“There's no shame in getting help,” Saburo picked up. “It's your life though, so whatevs.”

That was… surprisingly sweet.

“I'll tell you guys if it gets out of hand; I promise,” Mei confirmed, some of the tension bleeding out of her frame. Kyouhei looked her over, evaluating, before nodding. Saburo turned his attention back to his ice cream.

“So cool! It sounds like you have a tragic backstory or something,” Walker exclaimed. “They were wearing-”

As he rattled off his description of the kidnappers, it took all of Mei's concentration not to break out into a victory dance. They seemed like the same people described in the post (and, again, the same people she'd seen with Orihara), which meant she finally had a solid lead.

Maybe she'd finally get to go home, one of these days.

* * *

Despite her reservations about getting too attached to the van squad, when she got a text from Erika inviting her to a maid cafe with her and Walker for lunch on her day off, the woman agreed to tag along. She'd always wanted to go to one of those but never found the time. Her old friends (since when were they her  _ old  _ friends-) enjoyed the one they went to at an anime convention in the States, so she might as well try it out. It'd be fun, right?

The food itself was good, and the strawberry cake she ordered was absolutely divine. How the employees addressed her and her friends was a bit weird, but… good food. And good conversation! The three of them ended up talking about anime, manga, and light novels most of the time ( _ Accel World _ led to  _ SAO _ which led to  _ Darker than Black _ , somehow), which was neat. Mei just had to be extra careful not to talk about shows that hadn't been released yet. It was, admittedly, a struggle, but she thought she did alright.

Walker ended up leaving a bit early, so it was just Erika and her at the table when-

"Ah, that's my phone," Mei said, digging around in her pocket for the device. It was a text from Kyouhei; that was interesting. He hadn’t texted her since he entered in her contact information.

Oh.  _ Oh _ . He wanted to meet up with her by Yagiri Pharma, if she was interested. He didn’t just want to let the issue drop, and since the rest of the van squad did-

Well, she was still invested. And since he didn’t want to go alone…

Mei typed out a confirmation and hit send. She and Erika were getting ready to leave anyways. And this… this might help her get home. It was a priority. 

Besides, she really should check out the place in person sometime regardless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The plot train chugs along: Mei is uncertain while making slow moves towards a (maybe) way home, she metaphorically stumbles a bit, ect. Izaya was, once again, fun to write, even if I'm starting to fear that he's becoming a tad oversaturated (or omnipresent? I don't really know a better word to use here, rip; Orihara is here to stay though). He actually does have a reason why he stopped following Mei when he did, which might be more inferable later on (but you could probably guess it now). The van squad was cool to write too, and I achieved what I wanted to with the scene, which was nice. I also remember spending a lot of time on this chapter Googling ‘how to buy a cell phone,’ so that was fun haha.
> 
> We’re definitely getting closer to the end of this arc (it should be 5 more chapters), which is really neat. Thanks again for reading, and have a great day!


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